Somebody got a real steal on gas by siphoning a half-tank from a parked car in what the unwilling supplier says was "in the broad daylight" Friday afternoon.
Jean Cadney, business development specialist for Greenwood Utilities, says she's probably out about $16 in regular unleaded because of the theft.
"I want other people to be watching," Cadney warned.
She might have lost more if fellow-employee Tommy Kyle, supervisor of meter-reading, hadn't noticed there was something strange going on near Cadney's economy-size car shortly after 3 p.m.
The car was parked in a lot behind the Russell building between Fulton and Howard streets, near the utilities office.
Kyle said he looked through a back door of the office and saw a "light blue-colored, probably early 2000" four-door sedan oddly positioned next to Cadney's car and a black man standing beside it.
Kyle said he started to open the door, and the man jumped into the sedan. It "took off" south on Howard and over the railroad tracks.
Kyle's pretty sure that two or three people were in the car, but he said he can't identify them or the car - even though he later went out in his pickup to look for them.
Before that, he discovered that the gas door and cap of Cadney's car were left open, so he went to find Cadney.
She said, "I'm sitting in here at my desk, working, and one of our meter readers, Tommy Kyle, came in, and he was out of breath. He said, 'I think I just caught somebody siphoning gas out of your car."
Cadney said she had just filled up the day before at $2.04 a gallon, and her car holds about 16 gallons - she thinks.
She reported the theft to the police, but how are they going to catch the thief? The loot is probably in somebody's gas tank, she speculated indignantly.
"Imagine that!" Cadney said. "In the broad daylight! Who would have thought!"
