Crime & Safety
Cars Stolen by Unknowing Tow Truck Driver
He was trading towing three cars for one van he was going to sell for scrap metal, the Sheriff's Office reports.
An Acworth-area man is accused of conning a tow truck driver into stealing cars for him with stolen titles.
According to the arrest report, a man and his wife witnessed suspicious activity after three motorcycles and an unspecified number of vehicles, including a blue van, were taken from a Pine Brook Drive residence. The man and woman had been collecting the mail for their neighbor, who was gone for several months.
Driver Daniel Ray was stopped by Officer Torre Jennings of the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office with that same blue van on his tow truck from the Acworth residence at 7:14 p.m. Tuesday, April 12. According to the incident report, the neighbor who had called in the suspicious activity pointed out Ray’s truck to Jennings as he followed him.
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The officer pulled over Ray without any trouble and questioned him. He told Jennings he was taking the van as payment for towing three other vehicles for a man named “Donnie,” a.k.a. Donald Wayne Russell, 55, of Acworth. He had met him through another driver, Johnny Howard.
Howard later told Jennings he referred Russell to Ray because he did not want to do business with him because he knew he was involved with drugs, according to the report.
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Ray said one of the other vehicles he towed for Russell to Red Top Mountain Estates in Bartow County was a van with a four-wheel ATV and tools in the back. The other was a white Mazda RX7 towed to Port Victoria Subdivision in Woodstock, according to the report. Russell showed Ray the titles signed over to him for the vehicles, the tow truck driver said, and explained he bought them from a friend who was moving back to New York.
The last vehicle was a Mercedes that Ray had not picked up yet.
Jennings confirmed with the Pine Brook Drive resident via telephone that he had not sold any vehicles to Russell, whom he said he did not know, and that the titles should be in his home.
Deputy McCoy of the Cherokee Sheriff’s Office found that the house appeared to have been burglarized and entered through the garage.
The van was returned to the residence that night.
Russell was booked into the Cherokee County Adult Detention Center at 11:22 p.m. that night on a $39,700 bail and faces five charges of automobile theft and one charge of burglary. He was released on a property bond April 20.
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