LoJack Recovers a Stashed Tractor

At the end of the work day on June 4, 2009, a tractor owner parked his machine on a Harris County, Texas, construction site. The tractor was missing when he returned to the site the next morning, so he called the Harris County Sheriff Department. They processed a theft report, and the tractor’s information was entered into the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) police computer. The routine police procedure automatically activated the LoJack transponder concealed in the vehicle. An hour after being identified in the NCIC system as stolen, a Harris County Sheriff’s deputy and an officer with the Tomball, Texas, police department simultaneously picked up the silent LoJack homing signal on the LoJack Police Tracking Computers installed in their patrol cars. Using cues from the tracking computers, the officers tracked the tractor to a wooded expanse several miles from the scene of the theft. A foot search of the forest located the tractor hidden in a brushy area. Officers speculated that the thief hid the tractor to allow it to “cool off,” and to see if it would be traced to the location.