Crestwood car dealership manager nearly run over by car thief

CRESTWOOD, Ill. (WLS) -- A Crestwood car dealership manager was nearly run over by a woman stealing a car from his lot, a brazen crime caught on camera.

"When I made eye contact with her, I was like, 'Stop! Stop!' She wasn't. She was like no, no, no, and she kept on pushing the gas," said Mahmoud Elsayed, manager of Your Choice Autos Crestwood. "And then I just jumped before she ran me over."

Elsayed said the woman came to his dealership Thursday afternoon and was eyeing a Cadillac sedan.

Video shows her entering the office when all the employees are out back. At one point Elsayed enters a back room with vehicle keys, unaware someone is in the office. When he leaves, the woman walks back there.

"Starts searching which keys are for the Cadillac, and then when she finds the Cadillac keys, she took the whole bunch," Elsayed said.

Seconds later she's back outside and is able to enter the Cadillac.

At that moment Elsayed, who has pulled a car around for a customer, realizes something is wrong as the Cadillac backs up.

That's when the confrontation happens.

"It was kind of unreal for me. I didn't feel like this is really happening," he said.

Elsayed said within the past few months there have been at least a handful of thefts within his auto group, including an armed carjacking of a vehicle during a test drive in Posen.

Elsayed said the stolen Cadillac was later recovered on the side of the Borman Expressway near Gary.

"We have to think about how to prevent this from happening again," he said.

Elsayed said the incident has prompted changes at his dealership to ensure keys are secure.