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Juan Marrero, of New Britain, stopped to get gas around midnight on Monday, Oct. 28, at the Shell Station on the border of Plainville and New Britain. He left the car running as he filled his tank.
As Marrero waited, he noticed a friend a lane over and walked a few feet away to say hi. Within seconds, a black Mercedes pulls up, a man gets out, slips into the driver's seat of Marrero's Honda Accord, and speeds off. In all, the theft only took a few seconds.
The car caper was captured on the gas station's surveillance cameras.
When word got back to Marrero's best friend, Roberto Rabassa, who owns Wealth Wise Capital Management in Rocky Hill, he was incensed.
"(Juan) works nights in construction and busts his *ss for his family," he told Daily Voice.
Marrero is the father of two young children and his honorary third child is his car. He had put a lot of work into it, which made the Accord's orange body and carbon fiber hood unique, and Roberto knew that could be an advantage.
So, Roberto made a post. Then another. Then another. On Reddit — across three states, Facebook, anywhere he could to get more eyeballs looking for this car.
The posts blew up. Some got more than 300 shares, Rabassa said, with comments from others who've had their car stolen, tips and potential sightings, and encouragement from people tired of being ripped off.
The car was stolen around midnight. At 3 p.m. the same day, Juan got a Facebook message.
"Hey, your car is in front of my house!" with a photo of the orange Accord with the carbon fiber hood parked in a lot in Middletown. Juan called the police and rushed to retrieve it. Police were also quick to the scene, Roberto said.
"They showed up in Middletown with like six cars," he said. "The police were a big help through this."
Juan was worried the thieves would have stripped out his stereo or stolen his expensive rims, but the only thing missing was a bottle of cologne. No one has been arrested, Roberto said, and police have yet to issue an APB for a man with a nice smell.
Roberto said Juan was ecstatic to have his car back and decided to make one more modification right away.
"As soon as he got it back he put a tracker on the vehicle," Roberto said, laughing, "but he’s happy. Very happy."
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