Mr. Chen is a Chinese man who lives in Liaoning province, north of North Korea. As his summer trip through Hunan province in central China drew to a close he, had a difficult decision to make. Eat the price of a plane ticket home, or roadtrip. No, he didn’t have a car. But he is an experienced car thief.

He apparently considered doing the right thing. On May 31st, Mr. Chen spent 1,500 yuan ($200 USD) on the shuttle flight plane ticket. Later, he changed his mind. He cancelled his plane ticket. Then he went to the nearest car dealership and waited for it to close. Apparently he found it unlocked, nabbed keys from the office cabinet, and chose a car with a full tank of gas. Then he hit the road.

When the tank got low, he just made for another dealership. Mr. Chen stole cars from dealerships and also hotwired older models he found in parking lots. He never paid for a tank of gas. And he even began collecting valuables left in his stolen cars, reselling them, and using the cash for tolls and food.

By June 2nd, a dealership employee realized a $20k car was missing and alerted the police. They found the car abandoned. On June 3rd, a car owner tried to stop Chen. He fled in panic and injured the owner.

Still, it wasn’t until June 4th that police caught him. And how’d they get him? He got in trouble for sleeping in a car in a parking lot. Once Chen was in custody, police began to put together the story of the 700+ mile crime spree. He’d stolen eight cars worth a combined $140,000 USD. Authorities have recovered all of them.

Mr. Chen’s entire drive home to Liaoning would have covered 1,300 miles, and required 20+ hours on the road. But he made it about 750 miles, the equivalent of 13 hours of driving, before being caught. To make it home, he still needed to navigate the greater Beijing area, undetected. It seems unlikely he could have managed that with authorities already wising up.