Mar 19 2007 - AP
The owner of a stolen pickup truck, wearing only his underwear, used his wife's van to chase down the thief. The 29-year-old man was sipping coffee in his garage before dawn Sunday when his Ford Ranger suddenly started up and roared off.
The man, whose name was withheld, then jumped into his wife's van and, wearing only his underwear, gave chase. Inside the floor-installer's pickup were his tools.
"He said 'I just couldn't let my truck go because it's my livelihood,'" said Kirk Durbin of the California Highway Patrol.
The man pursued his pickup at speeds up to 80 mph in the unincorporated Riverside County community before ramming the Ford Ranger with his wife's van. The pickup struck a concrete barrier and the thief ran into a field and got into a Chevrolet S-10 pickup and fled, the CHP said.
The Ford Ranger had moderate damage to the front and back, and the van had major damage in the front, Durbin said.
By the time investigators arrived, the man had called his wife on a witness's cell phone and had her bring him some clothes, the CHP officer said.
"He's got a lot of courage," Durbin said.
There were no arrests.
Mankind has created spectacular works of art, engineered incredibly tall buildings, designed impressive supercomputers, lived in outerspace, discovered cures for nasty diseases. As a whole, nothing can compare to human intelligence, but sometimes, humans would rather lose their pants than there tools.
Owner chases pickup thief in underwear