A man walked into the valet stand at the Hyatt Regency Savannah on Aug. 14, claimed he was a professional basketball player with several cars parked at the hotel, and then drove off in a $90,000 BMW X5 that belonged to a car dealership. Savannah police have not announced an arrest, and the investigation remains active as detectives try to sort out how the case connects to at least two other valet-related vehicle thefts reported at downtown hotels in recent weeks.
The gray 2026 BMW X5 was a dealership loaner given to a Hyatt guest, and it was reported stolen from the hotel at 2 W. Bay St. on Aug. 14, according to WJCL. Hotel security told officers they had video showing the man taking the vehicle after telling valet staff he played professional basketball, and an officer requested that the SUV be entered into state and national stolen-vehicle databases. The dealership later tracked the BMW to the 2100 block of North Ocean Boulevard in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and an officer notified Myrtle Beach police, per the same outlet's reporting.
While looking into the BMW theft, hotel security also flagged the man as having been seen with a white 2025 Audi A5 that had been reported stolen out of Jacksonville. Police went on to find that Audi unlocked in the Hyatt's parking garage, showing no obvious exterior damage, WJCL reported. Savannah police records do not indicate whether the BMW or a separate stolen Toyota was ever recovered.
A Second Hotel, A Missing Key, and Dead Cameras
Less than a mile from the Hyatt, a separate valet theft was reported at Savannah's Fairfield Inn. A guest told police she checked into the hotel Aug. 5 and left her black 2019 Toyota C-HR and its key with the valet service shortly before 4 p.m., WJCL reported. She was given a retrieval code, and the following morning, around 9:38 a.m., she texted that code to request her car back, only to be told no valet attendants were available.
The valet manager told police the key was listed as checked in but was missing from the lockbox, and a search of the garage turned up no Toyota. According to reporting from the New York Post, the valet messaging system had actually received a text using the woman's retrieval code more than nine hours earlier, at 12:06 a.m. — long before she says she sent one. A license plate reader captured the Toyota on Dean Forest Road around 7 p.m. Aug. 5, the last known trace of the vehicle. Police also said the garage's cameras were not working at the time, and it remained unclear how someone gained access to the car.
A Third City Enters the Picture
Reports from the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office and the Savannah Police Department describe a third incident that stretches the case beyond Georgia. According to those reports, an Audi was allegedly taken from the Hyatt Regency Jacksonville Riverfront in a valet transaction on Aug. 13 before turning up at the Hyatt Regency Savannah the next day, per News4JAX. An unidentified man allegedly arrived at the Jacksonville hotel in a stolen Mercedes — which had itself been reported stolen from an Embassy Suites hotel in St. Augustine Beach and was later found back at the Hyatt Regency Jacksonville Riverfront — telling valet staff he needed to swap out his cars before driving off with the $30,000 Audi, according to the outlet's review of the reports. The Audi was listed as stolen in the National Crime Information Center, and the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office report lists the suspect as unknown; that case had not been cleared as of the reporting.
The white Audi was recovered at about 11 a.m. Aug. 14 in the Hyatt Regency Savannah's garage, parked unlocked with no obvious exterior damage. Savannah police have not publicly confirmed that the Jacksonville and Savannah cases are connected, and they have not publicly stated whether the Fairfield Inn, Hyatt Regency Savannah, and Jacksonville thefts involved the same person or were part of a larger crime operation, according to a separate WJCL report. WJCL, which first reported the Savannah cases, also noted that the hotel's general manager and staff at a neighboring hotel were locked out of their own camera systems while police tried to piece together the timeline.
Hotel Response and a Wider Pattern
Hyatt Regency Savannah said it took immediate action to assist the affected guest and is working with its third-party valet operator on enhanced security measures, the station reported. Savannah police, meanwhile, are still looking for a man connected with the string of auto thefts, according to WTOC, which confirmed no arrest has been announced and that the investigations remain active.
The Savannah and Jacksonville cases echo a broader pattern that has emerged at hotel valet stands elsewhere in the country. In Miami Beach, police arrested 24-year-old Gregory Yearty Jr. after surveillance video allegedly showed him crawling into a valet key room at the Setai Hotel to grab fobs for four luxury vehicles worth nearly $2 million combined, including a Rolls-Royce and a Mercedes-Benz G-Class, according to NBC Miami. Miami Beach Police Chief Wayne Jones called the rise in high-end vehicle theft a concerning trend nationwide in comments to that station.
A separate report from Century Risk Advisors found that valet-related car thefts have been increasing across Florida and elsewhere in the country, citing FBI data showing 1,020,729 car thefts nationwide in 2023, up from 1,008,756 the year before. Florida alone recorded 46,213 car thefts in 2023, ranking third nationally, per that report, which also referenced two arrests tied to valet lot thefts in Orange County, Florida, and a $400,000 Rolls-Royce Cullinan stolen from a hotel valet service in Georgia.
