Stolen twice, but Scoots is back

Queenstown man has got his beloved scooter back, even thought it was apparently stolen twice over the weekend.

Last Friday night, rafting guide Heath Weir (21) was out socialising with friends. When he went back to where he had left his beloved "Scoots" in the morning, the 50cc Suzuki scooter was missing.

After work on Sunday, he hitchhiked a ride home to Frankton with a stranger who, on hearing of the machine's disappearance, provided him with a lead.

"He tells me, 'I've heard of a flatmate of a friend who had a huge bender on Friday night and stole a scooter, taking it from Queenstown, along the Frankton Trail to Lake Hayes Estate'."

"I just said, 'Can you get a hold of these guys - I just want my scooter back' ."

Mr Weir also started his own investigation, spending hours driving around Lake Hayes Estate trying to find his maroon Scoots.

"He's my mean wheels."

Then he received a call from the driver who took him home, saying the scooter would be dropped at the Rec Ground in central Queenstown on Sunday night, just a block from Duke St where Scoots had been sitting on Friday night when it was taken.

Mr Weir showed up to the drop-off point, to be disappointed.

"He wasn't there, so I just went home."

Little did he know but his scooter had been at the drop-off point earlier but someone else had seen it and allegedly taken the scooter.

The next day, Mr Weir was "spinning a yarn" to clients of Queenstown Rafting, telling them how his beloved Scoots had been taken from him twice in two days.

One of the customers said they had seen a maroon scooter being loaded into a red SUV about 9pm on Sunday.

On Tuesday Mr Weir told Queenstown police his story and they checked the car park's CCTV footage, which led to the identification of a red four-wheel-drive similar to the one described.

Police were able to track down the vehicle's owners and located Mr Weir's scooter at their Sunshine Bay home, in a damaged condition.

A 26-year-old British man and a 23-year-old Queenstown woman were arrested and charged with theft of the motorcycle.

Despite the hassle, the damage and the wasted time, Mr Weir was still able to keep smiling about the episode.

"I have tried to be really positive about the whole situation. I kept thinking it was going to come back to me. It's been like a scavenger hunt."

 

 

 

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