Michigan man faces charges after Corvettes worth $1.2 million stolen from Kentucky plant
Court records show that Deantae Walker, 21, of Westland faces several charges, including receiving stolen property of $10,000 or more, criminal mischief, evading police and resisting arrest.
Bowling Green Police Department Public Information Officer Ronnie Ward said Wednesday that Walker is also being charged with engaging in organized crime after authorities discovered that all eight vehicles, valued at $1.2 million, left the plant at the same time.
Records show police in Bowling Green were notified of the incident when the Warren County (Kentucky) Sheriff's Office contacted them, saying they located what they believed to be a stolen Corvette. A witness said she saw a man driving a Corvette with a window sticker still attached at an apartment complex, and the manager of the GM plant confirmed the vehicle, along with seven others, had been stolen. As police continued to investigate, several of the other vehicles were located within 2 miles of the surrounding area.
More: Iconic Corvette faces changes ahead, but enthusiasts are confident
Later, a car transport driver notified police of a suspicious transaction. The driver was scheduled to transport one 2017 Corvette from Bowling Green to Michigan, but when he arrived, he was greeted by Walker and one other individual with three of the stolen vehicles. The driver said he was rushed by the pair to load the vehicles, but contacted police because he thought something was wrong.
Walker was arrested at the scene following a "brief struggle," with assistance from bystanders. The other person drove away in a Jeep with Ohio tags. Police were still looking for that person.
Records show that as Walker was later being booked into the Warren County Regional Jail, he said he would have "been paid big" had he been able to get the cars to Michigan.
GM Bowling Green Assembly Plant Senior Communications Manager Rachel Bagshaw said all the vehicles have been recovered and the company is working with affected car dealers and customers.
"We work with law enforcement agencies to identify emerging theft methods that affect our products and make updates as needed to defend against them," Bagshaw said. "As a result of this cooperation, we are aware of theft methods used at our facilities and employ appropriate countermeasures, the details of which cannot be shared for security reasons."
Reach Marina Johnson at Marina.Johnson@courier-journal.com.
This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Corvette theft case: Man charged with stealing $1.2M worth in Kentucky
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
3 hours ago
'Doomsday mom' Lori Daybell set to be sentenced in murder conspiracy trials
Lori Daybell is set to be sentenced in Arizona on Friday for conspiring with her late brother to kill her fourth husband in 2019. She will also be sentenced for conspiring with her brother to kill her niece's ex-husband in a failed drive-by shooting that same year. Daybell was found guilty of two counts of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder in two separate trials in Maricopa County this spring. She faces life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years for each conviction, prosecutors said. Her sentencing hearing is scheduled to take place Friday morning local time before Judge Justin Beresky, who presided over both trials. The so-called "doomsday mom" is already serving life in prison after being convicted in 2023 of murdering two of her children. Prosecutors in the Idaho trial argued that she and her current husband, Chad Daybell, thought the children were possessed zombies and murdered them in 2019 so that they could be together. She was also found guilty of stealing Social Security survivor benefits allocated for the care of her children after they went missing. Similarly, prosecutors in Maricopa County argued that she conspired with her brother to kill her estranged husband of 13 years, Charles Vallow, so she could get his $1 million life insurance policy and be with Chad Daybell, an author of religious fiction books whom she married four months after the deadly shooting. Prosecutors further said she invoked their "twisted" religious beliefs as justification for the murder and gave her brother "religious authority" to kill Vallow because they believed he was possessed by an evil spirit they referred to as "Ned." In the first of her Arizona trials, Lori Daybell argued that her brother, Alex Cox, shot Vallow in self-defense in her home in Chandler, Arizona, in July 2019. She was then found guilty in a second trial of scheming with Cox to kill Brandon Boudreaux, the ex-husband of her niece. Three months after Vallow's killing, Boudreaux called 911 to report that someone driving by in a Jeep shot at his vehicle outside his home in Gilbert, Arizona. Prosecutors said in a sentencing memorandum that Boudreaux continued to live in fear following the failed attempt on his life, wondering if Cox would "return to finish the job." Cox died from natural causes later in December 2019. Lori Daybell, 51, did not take the stand or call any witnesses in either trial, in which she represented herself. In her closing statement, she argued that her family has been struck by tragedy and that she did not conspire to commit any crime. Her sentencing hearing comes after failed attempts at getting new trials on both counts. After being convicted of conspiring to kill Vallow, she also unsuccessfully tried to remove Judge Beresky from the case, claiming he was biased against her. She frequently clashed with the judge while representing herself during the trials. During the second trial, Beresky at one point removed her from the courtroom after she became combative during discussions about her character. The judge had warned that if she referred to herself as having "great character," that could open the door for the state to introduce evidence to rebut that character, including regarding her previous convictions in Idaho. Both Lori and Chad Daybell were found guilty of first-degree murder for the deaths of her children in separate trials in Fremont County, Idaho. Joshua "J.J." Vallow, 7, and Tylee Ryan, 16, went missing months after Charles Vallow was killed. Their remains were found on an Idaho property belonging to Chad Daybell in June 2020 following a monthslong search. They were also found guilty of conspiring to kill Chad Daybell's first wife, Tamara Daybell, who died in October 2019 -- two weeks before Lori and Chad Daybell married in Hawaii. Chad Daybell was found guilty of murdering her. Lori Daybell is currently serving life in prison without parole, while Chad Daybell was sentenced to death for the three murders and now awaits execution on Idaho's death row.
Axios
4 hours ago
- Axios
Business owner showcases Moreland Avenue perils and calls for safety measures
We all know the urge to call someone out when they're acting out of pocket — but we also know that there's a time and place. Patrice Hull, who owns a business in Little 5 Points called Stuff We Wanna Say, is leaning into her company name by speaking candidly on social media about reckless driving on or near Moreland Avenue — and people crossing the roadway without regard for traffic signals. Why it matters: Hull's social media posts highlight how dangerous the four-lane state highway can be to motorists and pedestrians. "I see near-misses all the time," she said, referring to when she's watching the action from her storefront window. The latest: She's uploaded a few of those near-misses recorded by her security cameras on her 417 Moreland Avenue Instagram page, and some of those clips have gone viral. One post features a Waymo vehicle that tried to continue on a road that was closed, only to stop when it detected an Atlanta police officer in front of the car (it eventually turned around). Other videos show people dancing to the music she plays outside her store, one person sitting atop a Jeep as it travels along Moreland, and several people attempting to cross the road during a green light. What they're saying: While she showcases Little 5 Points' eccentricity, highlights the area's other businesses and promotes her shop, Hull believes that Moreland Avenue is one of the city's busiest and most dangerous streets. "It's also very mind-boggling that people want to just hop across the street like this a game of Frogger and they think, 'Oh, nobody's going to hit me,'" she told Axios. Hull said she wishes there were efforts to slow vehicular traffic to make the roadway safer for pedestrians. One idea she has is for the city to paint the crosswalks a bold color to signal to motorists that the intersection in front of her store is where a lot of pedestrians will cross the street. Context: Little 5 business owners and residents have been calling for ways to make the state highway safer for drivers and pedestrians. It is managed by the Georgia Department of Transportation. Those calls intensified this year after a driver fleeing a state trooper crashed into a vehicle at the Moreland-McLendon avenue intersection, killing 19-year-old Cooper Schoenke. That collision put the Georgia State Patrol's pursuit policy under renewed scrutiny, and the City Council passed a resolution calling for more transparency and restrictions around pursuits initiated by the state agency in Atlanta. The bottom line: Hull said she hopes people will continue to support the small businesses in Little 5 Points, but there has to be some mechanisms in place to protect pedestrians.
Boston Globe
10 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Lori Vallow Daybell to be sentenced on Arizona convictions, signaling end to legal saga
Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Public interest in Vallow Daybell, 52, grew as the investigation into her own missing children — 7-year-old Joshua 'JJ' Vallow and 16-year-old Tylee Ryan — took several strange and unexpected turns. Their bodies were found buried in rural Idaho on Chad Daybell's property on June 9, 2020. Advertisement Chad Daybell was sentenced to death in the killings of the children and his wife, Tammy, the romantic rival. Vallow Daybell was convicted of conspiring to kill Tammy. Advertisement Prosecutors in Arizona are seeking life sentences on each of Vallow Daybell's latest convictions. Once sentenced in Arizona, Vallow Daybell will be sent back to prison in Idaho. Charles Vallow was fatally shot in 2019 Charles Vallow filed for divorce four months before he died. He said Vallow Daybell became infatuated with near-death experiences and claimed to have lived numerous lives on other planets. He told police she threatened to kill him and he was concerned for his children. Vallow was shot when he went to pick up his son at Vallow Daybell's home outside Phoenix, police said. Vallow Daybell's daughter, Tylee, told police the sound of yelling woke her up, and she confronted Vallow with a baseball bat to defend her mother. Vallow managed to take the bat from her. Cox told police that he shot Vallow after he refused to drop the bat and came after him. Cox died five months later from a blood clot in his lungs. His self-defense claim was later called into question, with investigators saying Cox and Vallow Daybell waited more than 40 minutes before calling 911. Right before his death, Vallow and his wife's other brother, Adam Cox, planned an intervention to try to bring Lori back into the mainstream of their shared faith in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Adam Cox, a witness for the prosecution, testified his sister claimed to be in the process of 'translating from being a mortal human to an immortal human being, a celestial being.' He also said she told people that Vallow was no longer living and that a zombie was inside her estranged husband's body. Someone shot at Brandon Boudreaux months later Almost three months after Vallow died, someone fired a shot at Boudreaux from an open window of a Jeep as he was driving up to his home in Gilbert, another Phoenix suburb. It narrowly missed Boudreaux, the ex-husband of Vallow Daybell's niece, Melani Pawlowski. Advertisement Boudreaux said Pawlowski aspired to be like her aunt. The two started attending religious meetings together in 2018. Soon after, Pawlowski said they should stockpile food for the end of the world. Prosecutors tied the Jeep to Vallow Daybell and said she loaned it to Alex Cox. The two bought a burner phone used to carry out the attack and tried to concoct an alibi for Cox to make it seem like he was in Idaho at the time, prosecutors said. Vallow Daybell is representing herself Unlike her Idaho case, Vallow Daybell chose to represent herself at both Arizona trials, even though she isn't a lawyer. At her first trial, she argued her brother Alex Cox acted in self-defense when killing Vallow. She struggled with legal duties that most lawyers consider routine, such as lining up witnesses to testify. She argued at the second Arizona trial that no evidence established that she conspired with Cox to kill Boudreaux. 'I'm not defensive,' Vallow Daybell told jurors. 'I'm not angry.' She clashed with Judge Justin Beresky and tried to get him removed from the case, arguing he was biased against her. She insisted on exercising her speedy trial rights yet complained she didn't have enough time to prepare. During jury selection in the case involving Boudreaux, Vallow Daybell said she was sick and couldn't go to trial. Beresky pushed ahead, saying there was no objective evidence to support her claim.
