Skip to main content

Dangerous contents

Car thieves in the Russian city of St Petersburg may have got more than they bargained for when they stole a Mercedes SUV. The vehicle owner and his driver were settling his pet Asian Leopard Cat into the rear of the car when the thieves struck.
February 28, 2012 Read time: 1 min
Car thieves in the Russian city of St Petersburg may have got more than they bargained for when they stole a Mercedes SUV. The vehicle owner and his driver were settling his pet Asian Leopard Cat into the rear of the car when the thieves struck. The car owner has offered a reward of US$91,000 for the return of the leopard but said that as long as the animal is returned he will not press charges and is not asking for the vehicle to be returned. The rare breed of Asian Leopard Cat is worth around $350,000 and was a gift from a Moscow businessman he had dealings with. The animal is native to Russia's southern border with China and across Southeast Asia but although only a few thousand of the species remain, it is not considered endangered.

Related Content

  • Jakarta’s jams top traffic congestion toll
    May 22, 2015
    A survey by oil firm Castrol reveals that Indonesia’s capital Jakarta suffers the worst traffic delays of any city in the world. Turkey’s commercial centre Istanbul comes second in the congestion study, with Mexico City in third place. Castrol’s Magnatec Stop-Start Index says that Jakarta’s drivers suffer some 33,240 stop-starts/year, equivalent to 27.22% of their total travel time being stationary.
  • Youthful driver
    May 16, 2014
    In Norway a 10 year old boy has now been stopped by police on two occasions for driving his parent’s car. On the first occasion the boy waited until his parents were sleeping and then sneaked out of his room and drove off in the family car in a bid to visit his grandparents, some 60km away. Worse still, he took his 18 month old sister along for the ride.
  • Road user charging, the way to highway investment?
    February 27, 2012
    Tough political decisions have to be made to ensure highway investment - *Dr Max Lay reports
  • Road user charging, the way to highway investment?
    April 12, 2012
    Tough political decisions have to be made to ensure highway investment - *Dr Max Lay reports Our road systems and how we use them have changed dramatically over the last few centuries, and yet some problems persist and others reappear. For most of human history roads have been used by foot traffic and by cumbersome wagons hauled at walking pace. Roads were built to provide some obvious advantage in commerce or conquest. They were then grudgingly maintained by those who might gain some advantage from the