Reminds me of a buddy's story. he bought a '62 Impala convertible from his uncle for $10 around 1984. We drove it around, and the brakes failed on us once and we almost went into Lake Washington. He parked it, and then a few years later, when he had started working for a car resto place, decided to work on it. It got stolen from a trailer behind his house one night. Reported it, etc., but nothing happened.
Fast forward twenty years, to 2016. He got a call from an LA detective and they had his car. It was sitting on the street in front of a paint shop -- the new owner, who didn't know it was hot, had it painted and all sorts of work done to it. Someone walked by and thought it was his stolen '62 Impala, so he called it in and the polcie towed it. They looked at the vin tag in the door, decided it wasn't stolen, and called the paint shop to come get it. The guy at the paint shop was rude and insisted the cops tow it back to the shop. The cops said no, the guy swore at them, and then the cop said he was going to hold onto it for a few more days and do another check. This time they checked the vin on the frame and discovered it was my friend's car. After about 9 months, he could get it, so he drove down from Seattle and picked it up. The guy who bought it from the thieves had put a big engine in it and begged my friend for it. Anything on the car, whether original or not, belonged to my friend but he let him have the engine back. I met him there, and he gave me his girlfriend's KZ400 since she didn't ride it and it had sat for a few years (got it running, rode it around, sold it a year later before I moved and sent him half the money, which was our deal). Dunno if he ever finished the Impala but he had everything for it, including a new engine.
Glad this recovery was quicker.
