A man from Bellaire, Michigan was preparing to take his gorgeous restomod 1960 Corvette to Autorama, a huge custom car show in Detroit’s Cobo Hall. But the car never made it there, because someone stole it, chopped it into bits, and—what kind of bastard does this—set it on fire, Fox 32 reports.
Late at night in mid February, thieves took the man’s 1960 Corvette—as well as his 1996 Ford F-350, custom trailer, and 2000 Jeep Wrangler—straight out of a parking lot in Southfield, Michigan. When the man woke up, all of his vehicles were gone.
The interview below of the victim is hard to watch, as it shows Dave Fischbach, owner of Dave’s Collision and Car Repair, discussing the loss of his beloved 1960 Corvette:
This quote right here makes me especially sad, because it’s very clear that Dave is one of us Jalops:
I’ve been a car guy my whole life...I started when I was 14 years old, working and fixing up cars. I couldn’t afford to pay anybody to do it so I had to learn how to do it myself. So it just kind of grew into a hobby.
The ’vette meant a lot to Dave and his shop, as MLive reports that the cherry red sports car was the team’s first foray into ground-up vehicle customization. Dave’s shop bolted a 480 horsepower LS3 engine under the hood, an automatic transmission in the trans tunnel, and digital gauges on the dash
The Corvette was a three-time National Corvette Show winner, as Fox 32 News notes, and boy does it seem like Dave was in love with the thing, telling the news site:
It rode like a new car, it steered like a new car, it performed like a new car. It had air conditioning power windows, all the conveniences of the new cars.
But now that pristine 1960 Corvette is a pile of ash because of Detroit-area car thieves. Dave says he thinks the thieves “probably stripped every part off of it that they could sell, or use, or wanted or whatever,” and that he’s now keeping an eye online for any recognizable parts that might come up for sale in an attempt to track down the culprits.
Dave is clearly bummed about the whole thing, but he has hope that he’ll eventually get these guys:
You can’t put a price on prestige and craftsmanship and things like that. It’s just really hard to do when you have a car like that. There wasn’t another one like it in the country...It is an active investigation and we’re just kinda holding out hope for hope that they catch who did it.
The Detroit News points out that the custom trailer was also damaged beyond repair, but there is good news: the 2000 Jeep Wrangler turned up in decent shape, aside from a few little bruises from the thieves removing the stereo.
I hope the police finds these terrible, soulless people who would immolate such a fine piece of machinery. Even if the criminals are never put behind bars, I have little doubt that the car gods will get them for such an egregious sin.