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Highlands Today

Owner Chases SeaDoo Thieves

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By GARY PINNELL

Highlands Today

Published: August 3, 2008

AVON PARK - Somebody was watching out for Mike Driggers on Friday.

Like his neighbor, who spotted two males in a white Ford Econoline van lurking about the middle-class neighborhood just off CR 17A, north of the city. Suspiciously, they drove past the Driggers' house, turned around at the end of the cul de sac, parked and waited several minutes before they came back.

"They cut my lock and they hooked on my trailer," said Driggers on Saturday morning. "They peeled out, and left that mark there." His two Sea-Doos were gone.

So his neighbor called the sheriff's emergency line, and their daughter called Driggers at work. He's a service advisor at Alan Jay Chevrolet in Sebring.

He left at 4 p.m. to go home and talk with deputies, who were working the crime scene. When they finished, Driggers was too antsy to just sit around the house, so he got back into his black Avalanche pickup truck and decided to check out the roads around his neighborhood.

He took a chance on CR 627, an old bombing range road which leads to Avon Park.

Bingo. There, behind an old white van, were his Sea-Doos.

Driggers called 911, and stayed on the phone. There was a green pickup in front of them. He got the tag number, which proved useful, because the pickup also appeared later.

When the van pulled over, Driggers, who had been told by the deputies not to confront the men, passed them, then stopped and turned around.

They realized they'd been spotted. The passenger jumped out, disconnected the trailer, got back inside, and the van drove off.

"I guess they thought I'd let them go," Driggers said.

No chance. He followed them again, and finally stopped when they turned into an orange grove.

When Deputy Cara Moseley arrived, he started to relay his story when the white van came bouncing out of the orange grove.

"It was the funniest thing I'd ever seen in my life," Driggers said. Moseley and the deputies converged on the van, said Lt. Kenny Johnson.

David Morales, 33, and Fred Morales, 20, were arrested, Johnson said.

On Saturday, at Moseley's advice, Driggers bought a Gorilla Guard trailer lock, a $25 device which slips inside the ball cavity on the trailer. "It can't be cut with ordinary bolt cutters," he said. "Now, they're going into storage."

Gary Pinnell can be reached at gpinnell@highlandstoday.com or 863 386-5828

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