By Angela Woodall
Inside Bay Area (California)
Copyright 2007 MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG Newspapers
All Rights Reserved
OAKLAND — Some car thieves go for Jaguars or Porsches. Others prefer something a bit more exotic -- like an ambulance.
But the motive for making off with an ambulance from the parking lot of Summit Hospital about 4:45 p.m. Tuesday was a mystery.
The full-size vans are gas guzzlers, stick out like a sore thumb and, in the case of the stolen rig, the Global Positioning System may have been broken. The ambulance was recovered at 6:15 p.m. on the 3000 block of Filbert Street, unoccupied and undamaged, said police Sgt. Gary Foppiano. Police are not sure if anything was stolen. AMR, the ambulance company, will do an inventory of the contents of the ambulance.
Ambulances stock high-tech equipment and some medications, as well as controlled substances, such as morphine.
This is the second rig to be taken. Over the weekend someone tried to take an ambulance at the McAfee Coliseum but abandoned it in the coliseum parking lot. While the ambulance was not taken, the thieves did get away with the keys, which can be used on any AMR ambulance.
Police said the medics were dropping off a patient at Summit and left the keys in the ignition and the doors unlocked. Police called the FBI and Department of Homeland Security because it was the second rig stolen in a few days’ time, which raised concerns that it could be related to a national security threat.