Clever, but the same case shows the difficulty of getting away with it, even if you are able to steal a Tesla. He was tracked by his use of the supercharging network, which allowed law enforcement to find and arrest him a few days later.
I don't own a Tesla, but this implies it's possible to turn the GPS off.
Well, if you stole the car, and now everyone is aware this is a way to track them...
Why not? Plenty of folks with electric vehicles charge at home and such.
I agree it's usually to chop or sell - in this kid's case though, he was probably planning on keeping it.
Auto recovery has a terrible success rate. The goal is to get them chopped or into containers for overseas consumption. You will eventually be caught if you keep driving it around.