A RETIRED mechanic turned super sleuth to track down his £65,000 car which had been stolen and hidden 40 miles away.
Ronnie Hutton’s sporty Audi R8 was stolen from the garage at his home in Stirling in the early hours of Thursday morning.
Police told him the car, which was uninsured as it was off the road for the winter, had been seen in Edinburgh so he and a friend embarked on a “needle in a haystack” mission to find it.
That afternoon, Mr Hutton, 60, discovered it hidden on a street in Colinton.
The retired Ministry of Defence mechanic, who served in Afghanistan and spent nine years saving up for the Audi, said: “I knew it would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack but it’s my pride and joy. I’m now a very happy man.
“My friend runs a vehicle recovery business so he knows the most common areas where stolen cars are hidden.
“We had a list of around 15 postcodes and I started at one side of the city and he went to the other.”
Just as he was about to give up for the day Mr Hutton drove into the EH13 area.
“We figured the thieves would leave it somewhere affluent where it would not look out of place,” he said.
“It was around 3pm and as I turned into the street I caught glimpse of a red car roof and knew that it was my car. I was so excited.
“It was parked neatly next to an expensive block of flats. The police told me that if I found it, I shouldn’t touch or move it, so that it could be fingerprinted.”
He added: “In the half hour it took for the police to arrive, I was getting increasingly concerned because these guys could be watching from the flats or appear at any moment.
“I believe it would have been stolen to order and had I not found it, it would have been in a container and over the sea.”
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