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The owner of a food truck stolen in Montgomery County, Maryland, is hoping to raise money to get his business back on the road.
James Turner was just days away from serving customers from his truck when it was stolen, gutted and found in Charles County.
“It’s a shell of what it used to be,” Turner said. “There’s a lot of damage, it’s been stripped, been painted over.”
Now, a GoFundMe page has been launched and Turner is hoping to start over. But, he needs a little help since he spent $50,000 of his savings on the first truck.
“I plan on pursuing getting a truck ready. Unfortunately not the truck I had,” he said.
He’s waiting to get the truck back from police to see the total extent of the damage.
The GoFundMe page has a goal of $25,000 and raised about $5,000 as of 2 p.m. Sunday.
Turner has been a chef and worked in kitchens for more than 30 years and with restaurants hit hard by the pandemic, he thought a food truck would be a good way of serving restaurant quality food to the public.
“I will be back out there. I’m determined to be out there. I’m not giving up,” Turner said. “I’ll have to dig deep and do the same thing again. It’s just work.”
The “Turner’s Beltway Bistro” food truck disappeared from the 8800 block of Brookville Road in Silver Spring on Memorial Day.
Turner said police haven’t told him much about how the $50,000 truck got to Charles County.
“Not only does the stealing of the truck affect me, but it affects the people that were going to be working with me.”
WTOP’s Matt Small contributed to this report.
