Volkswagen Refuses to Help Police Track Down Stolen Car and Abducted Child, Citing Lapsed Subscription

In Illinois, a state in the United States of America, a 34-year-old pregnant lady was assaulted by a carjacker who trapped her kid in the backseat of her Volkswagen and ran over her with the car, and went away with the car. Even though she was badly injured, she managed to call 911. The Lake County sheriffs called Volkswagen’s Car-Net service to track her car down.

Being “strict” with the company policies, Volkswagen refused to cooperate with the police. Because the lady didn’t renew her subscription to Volkswagen’s Car-Net service. To cooperate with the situation, Volkswagen insisted that someone must pay the $150 fee to reactivate the tracking service. The sheriffs tried pleading with Volkswagen by explaining the gravity of the situation but Volkswagen couldn’t be more bothered about it.

The said fee was later paid by a relative but the dispute ended up causing a costly delay. Deputy chief Chris Covelli described this delay as “16 minutes of hell”, according to the Chicago Tribune. Covelli also said that the information he got after this “cooperation” became worthless because a bystander called the police informing them that he had found the child in a parking lot where the carjacker dumped the car and the child. The kid was not harmed, thankfully.

Later, Volkswagen tried to blame a third-party subcontractor for “customer service”. A Volkswagen representative said in a statement, “Volkswagen has a procedure in place with a third-party provider for Car-Net Support Services involving emergency requests from law enforcement. They have executed this process successfully in previous incidents. Unfortunately, in this instance, there was a serious breach of the process.”