An investigation into what South Precinct detectives were initially led to believe was illegal drug activity at Shell Oil’s 351 Harding Place location turned out to be the theft of a significant amount of gasoline.
Earlier in the week, the police department received a tip that a number of automobiles were pulling up to the gas pumps after the business office had closed. According to the information, drivers were putting the nozzles from gas pumps into their tanks, but no product was being sold.
During surveillance at the pumps at 1:30 a.m. today, Detective Scott Sulfridge saw that two cars and their drivers were on the property for 45 minutes. Flex officers pulled in and blocked the automobiles. While talking to one driver, Brandi Washington, 21, gasoline started to overflow from the nozzle in her tank, although no gallon or dollar amount showed on the pump.
Washington and the other motorist, Christopher Sims, 36, of Nashville, who did not know each other, admitted to the officers that they had come to the station to steal gasoline by manipulating the credit card mechanism on the pump. Washington, a college student, said she had learned of the manipulation process from fellow students. Sims said he was told how to do it by his wife, who, he said, heard talk of it at her place of employment.
While the manipulation sent gasoline through the pump, it flowed very slowly, causing a thief to stay parked at the station for an extended period of time.
Officers found numerous credit card receipts on the ground and in trash cans that showed $0.00, indicating that a number of motorists took part in the thievery. The station’s management was unsure how much gasoline had been stolen in the recent past, but reported noticing significant differences in the amount of gasoline that should have been in its storage tanks.
While this particular Shell station appears to be the only one affected by the gas pump manipulation, the police department today reported the scheme to the Tennessee Oil Marketers’ Association so that it can pass the word to the state’s gasoline retailers.
Washington and Sims were issued state misdemeanor citations charging theft.
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