The ultimate Triumph: Stolen motorcycle retrieved 46 years later
More than 46 years after his $300 Triumph motorcycle was stolen from his backyard, a Nebraska man, now 72, has been reunited with his bike, U.S. customs officials announced Monday.
The man’s blue and black Triumph Tiger 100 motorcycle was en route to Japan from the Los Angeles/Long Beach ports complex when it was recovered Wednesday, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials said. The bike was stolen in early February 1967 from the man’s backyard, according to the agency.
The police report at the time valued the bike at $300 and said it had been parked in the backyard through the winter. A thief apparently forced open a wooden fence to get to it.
Half a country away and nearly half a century later, the bike resurfaced on Wednesday at the Los Angeles/Long Beach seaport complex in a shipping manifest for Yokohama, Japan. The bike was valued at $9,000 and described as being in remarkably good condition.
Authorities seized the bike and tracked down its Midwestern owner, who still lives in Omaha.
It’s the third vehicle customs officials recently recovered that had been lost for more than 20 years, officials said.
Los Angeles field operations director Todd Owen said in a statement that federal authorities regularly check outbound vehicles and have had remarkable success. And sometimes, Owen said, “a few have nice stories like this one.”
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