Jonathan Gualpa Accused Of Stealing A Cab To Drive To Six Flags, Fell Asleep On The Way There, Park Was Closed

A teenager is accused of stealing a New York City cab in an effort to drive it to a nearby theme park, but he fell asleep on the way to the park that isn’t even open yet for the season anyway.

As The New York Post reports, Jonathan Gualpa, 19, apparently failed to think things through before allegedly stealing an NYC taxi, purportedly in an effort to have a little fun at nearby Six Flags Great Adventure. The teen failed on three key points.

At about 5:45 a.m. Tuesday morning, according to New Jersey Advance Media, the NYPD received reports of a possibly-stolen taxicab. Apart from breaking the law, that was actually pretty good planning on Gualpa’s part: you can avoid long lines at a theme park by getting there early and going on a weekday.

What Gualpa apparently failed to realize is that New York City taxicabs are equipped with GPS, which means that any missing cab can be found relatively easily using off-the-shelf software. Sure enough, the car’s GPS unit revealed that it was in nearby Rochelle Park, New Jersey.

That was his first mistake.

His second was apparently failing to get a good night’s sleep the night before his alleged crimes. When police caught up to the driver of the allegedly-stolen cab, they found him in the back seat of the car, taking a nap. When questioned, Gualpa allegedly admitted that he was headed to Six Flags Great Adventure, down the road in Jackson, New Jersey.

I was so obsessed with this roller coaster. It is still in my bucket list though. Kingda Ka is the tallest roller coaster in the world which is located at Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson, New Jersey. Would you actually ride this? pic.twitter.com/JrxuzJHTXO

— ? (@saredha98) March 4, 2019

Police joked that stealing a car and then making the approximately one-hour-and-45-minute drive was apparently too tiring for the young man. Where he was caught (Rochelle Park) is still quite a distance from Great Adventure (in Jackson, still about an hour and a half away).

Mingle with #Magic983 at Six Flags Great Adventure Opening Weekend for cool #prizes! Details at https://t.co/sIHqp9G6aI

— Magic 98.3 (@Magic983) March 19, 2019

Third, Gualpa apparently pulled a Clark Griswold (National Lampoon’s Vacation) and got into wacky shenanigans on his way to a theme park that wasn’t even open. Clark, of course, didn’t have the option of looking up Wally World’s operating schedule on the internet, it being 1983 and all, but Gualpa did. And if he’d bothered to look at the theme park’s calendar, he’d have clearly seen that the park doesn’t even open for the season until April 6. Further, it’s not open on weekdays until April 23, meaning that Gualpa’s plan to visit the park on a Tuesday would have had to wait for another month.

Gualpa has been charged with receiving stolen property and has been released pending a court hearing. The allegedly-stolen cab has been returned to the taxi company.