Police have completed their investigation and say that a 50-year-old car found submerged in a pond at a Waukegan park was a stolen vehicle owned by the city.
The Waukegan Police Department and Waukegan Fire Department responded around 2:30 p.m. on September 10 to Bevier Park, 2255 West York House Road in Waukegan, for a report of a car in the water.
The Waukegan Park District had a contractor conducting maintenance on the pond in the park, according to Waukegan Fire Department Fire Marshal Todd Zupec.
They discovered a submerged vehicle in the pond during their work.
The park district called 911 to report the discovery and emergency crews arrived to assess the situation.
Zupec said fire crews found the vehicle was submerged below the water in silt up to the windows.
The vehicle was removed from the water by a tow truck.
The car was inspected by emergency crews and found empty, Zupec said.
Zupec said the vehicle appeared to be an older model car and the scene was turned over to the Waukegan Police Department to try and identify an owner.
Waukegan Deputy Police Chief Scott Chastain said the car, a 1974 Ford LTD, was in the water for a long time.
Officers were only initially able to obtain a partial vehicle identification number (VIN) from the vehicle.
A former city employee contacted the Waukegan Police Department after hearing of the incident, Chastain said.
He reported that the car found was possibly a City of Waukegan vehicle that had been stolen on April 25, 1978, from a parking lot near city hall.
The police department confirmed that the vehicle recovered matched the 1978 police report for the stolen car, which belonged to the public works department, Chastain said.