fogd00d said:
What is the elapsed time between the theft and that picture again?
That picture is from about 2 years before I owned the vehicle. I can't take credit for the vinyl work on it in that pic. I certainly did appreciate how much hard work had gone into it (since that is also my line of work), and was looking to fix it up since the vinyl was starting to deteriorate by the time the vehicle was in my hands. The previous owner went cheap and only got 3 year rated vinyl for the vehicle, so it definitely needed replacing.
It was when I started to redo the kit that I realized that I had something else in my possession. A lot of the crappy white paint came off with the vinyl during removal...even though I took great care in the removal of the vinyl. Underneath the white paint was silver metallic paint...but the vin number did not indicate that it was a special edition, so I was a bit stumped at that point. It wasn't for another year before I actually found proof that it was originally a special edition (and discovered that the car was actually stolen at one point).
I take no responsibility for the defacement of the Special Edition. Since discovering that it was a special edition, I have done everything I can to try to restore it back to it's original condition. There still is a long ways to go....but I now have all of the parts that I need in order to complete the task.