How’s this for the Jeep Wrangler being the ultimate freedom machine? In a very Fast and Furious moment, two women used their Jeep Wrangler to repeatedly ram a Correctional officer’s Toyota Camry transporting a prisoner. The two Australian women rammed the cop car so many times that they successfully sprung their pal from the 5-0. The new Jeep Wrangler ads better read: “2021 Jeep Wrangler: Be free; no matter what.” 

Not sure I’d pick a Jeep Wrangler as a getaway car

The two unabashed ladies responsible for the breakout used their JL Jeep Wrangler to repeatedly bash a corrections officer’s Toyota Camry while transferring the prisoner. According to CarScoops, eventually, 28-year-old prisoner Kane Quinn escaped from the Toyota Camry and fled the scene in the Jeep with 28-year-old Lila Rosemary Walto.

If it wasn’t already feeling like a stereotypical action movie, only an hour after the Toyota Camry escape, authorities found the Jeep Wrangler used in the ramming abandoned and torched in a nearby suburb. However, unlike most of the big action movies, the two women responsible for springing the jailbird and the jailbird himself were found and apprehended in a house in Canberra that same evening. 

Well, it was fun while it lasted

Not much changed for Quinn; he was charged with escaping custody and was sent back to the big house. Although reports don’t tell us much about the other unnamed female co-conspirator, Walto was charged with assaulting frontline staff, dangerous driving, car theft, and property damage. 

“I was heading home from work [and] I looked in my rearview mirror and saw this white Wrangler, Jeep speeding up behind me going way quicker than the 80-kilometer speed limit,” witness Annie di Silva told ABC News after the incident. “I see [the car] aggressively swerve and clip the back of the white Toyota Camry, and at this point, the Toyota Camry spun out onto the median strip. It then takes off in the other direction away from the hospital.”

Maybe a Jeep Wrangler is a good getaway vehicle? 

Ok, so Jeep Wranglers are slow, cumbersome, and finicky; not the best three attributes for needing to get away quickly. However, they do have the ability to traverse landscapes that most vehicles can’t. Not only is this the one thing that could make a Wrangler a good escape vehicle, but it’s also one of the only reasons anyone still buys these 4×4 boxes. 

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again; Jeep Wranglers aren’t actually any good at being cars, but they are great at being Jeeps. I mean that most people who buy a Wrangler love them, despite the fact that they are uncomfortable, somewhat unreliable, inefficient, and too expensive. Jeep Wrangler owners love their Jeeps for exactly what makes this Thelma and Louise story actually make some sense. 

Jeep Wrangler owners love their Jeeps because they love the idea of it. When you drive a Wrangler, you immediately feel like you have options. You feel capable. You know that “this Wrangler could get me out of a pickle if I needed it too.” It almost urges you to find pickles just to triumph over them. 

Whether the Wrangler owner ever gets in these situations or not is irrelevant because it’s not about it actually doing the thing (at least for some Wrangler owners); it’s about feeling like you can. 

In that respect, I would argue that the Wrangler is the perfect getaway vehicle because it inspires that feeling that it can do whatever you need it to… and if it can’t, just torch it and run away.