VW apologizes after demanding $150 to help find toddler taken in carjacking

Illinois police racing to find a stolen Volkswagen Atlas with a 2-year-old boy inside hit a roadblock when they contacted the manufacturer for help tracking it down.

A representative from VW's Car-Net telematics service refused to provide the vehicle's location until the owner paid a $150 fee to reactivate remote access because the trial period had expired.

"The detective basically pled with the representative, letting them know this was a life-or-death situation," Christopher Covelli, deputy chief of the Lake County Sheriff's Office, told The Washington Post.

By the time a family member of the owner provided a credit card number so police could pay the fee and locate the vehicle, the boy already had been found safe.

The thieves had abandoned him in a parking lot, and police located the Atlas nearby.

Although the delay getting GPS information from Car-Net didn't result in any harm to the toddler, it frustrated the police, who said they hadn't encountered such a demand before.

"Most companies are very good with providing information [when] it could save lives," Covelli said. "We've never had a major delay because we had to provide payment first."

VW, in a statement to the Post, apologized for the representative's failure to follow procedure for handling emergency requests from law enforcement.

"Unfortunately, in this instance, there was a serious breach of the process," the statement read. "We are addressing the situation with the parties involved."