Police arrested a 26-year-old Florida Uber driver Thursday morning after police said he was caught driving a $240,000 Ferrari that had been reported stolen.
The driver, Hilburn Jay Brendon Hunkins of Kissimmee, told the officer that the car belonged to a friend, but could not provide a name or phone number, the arrest report said.
A Gainesville police officer reported just before 9 a.m. that he saw a black Ferrari driving at a suspiciously slow speed next to a “high-end red Corvette,” an arrest report said.
The officer suspected the vehicles may have been stolen, but the Corvette had a temporary tag that could not be read, according to the arrest report.
When the officer pulled up next to the Ferrari, which still had the dealer's sticker on the window, his license plate reader recognized the vehicle as stolen out of Palm Beach County and he pulled it over.
The Corvette was not stopped by police.
Hunkins asked to use his cellphone, “and attempted to erase the phone prior to it being taken away,” the officer reported.
Hunkins was arrested and charged with felony grand theft.
He was being held without bond at the Alachua County Jail.
In a tongue-in-cheek Facebook post, the Gainesville Police Department noted that the car's listed 18 mpg fuel economy rating was incorrect.
“We were only able to get 10 mpg out of it when we drove it to the station,” the post said, before adding, “(That) is a joke. We had it safely towed for the rightful owner.”
The report did not say if Hunkins was on his way to pick up an Uber passenger at the time of his arrest.
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