3 Cars Stolen Out of Junction Auto Showroom

December 19, 2022 by Jamie Ward

Two sports cars and a Jeep Cherokee were stolen directly out of Junction Auto’s showroom on Mayfield Road in Munson Township early Monday morning, according to the Geauga County Sheriff’s Office.

“This was pretty brazen,” Chief Deputy Tom Rowan said.

A fourth vehicle was left running during the theft, Rowan said, as it was likely used to push or pull one of the stolen cars that got stuck in the gate during the escape.

It’s unclear how long the incident lasted, but somebody driving by called deputies when they noticed people around the parking lot at about 2:15 a.m., Rowan said.

Deputies arrived in about four minutes.

Chester Township police responded to the intersection of Mayfield and Chillicothe roads, but by the time they saw the stolen vehicles, they were “going well over 100 mph,” Chester Police Chief Craig Young said.

A Challenger can exceed a speed of 200 mph, according to the Dodge website.

“I don’t know if I’d call what we did as a pursuit,” Young said. “There wasn’t a whole lot of time for us to take action, so our officers terminated it when it was obvious we weren’t going to catch them.”

Because of the time, Young said there were no other vehicles on the road.

Stolen were a 2022 White Dodge Challenger Scatpack, a 2021 Granite Challenger SRT Hellcat, and a 2020 Black Jeep Cherokee Trackhawk.

Two of the stolen vehicles were listed prominently on the Junction Auto website: the Scatpack, listed at $55,910, and the SRT Hellcat, listed at $72,900.

An email from the previous owner of the Jeep Cherokee Trackhawk, who asked not to be identified, wrote: “You should know that people who own these these vehicles know how they are very sought after and stolen often.”

The Trackhawk was listed at $89,900 on the Junction Auto website.

Rowan said detectives are working the case and will monitor other areas to see if other vehicles are stolen in a similar way.