JOELTON, Tenn. (WTVF) — A Davidson County business owner is out thousands of dollars after thieves broke into his shop. Now, he’s trying to make things right for his customers — even though he wasn’t the one who caused the problem.
Dealing with thousands of dollars worth of damage was never part of Charles Scalf’s childhood dream of owning a dirt-bike repair shop.
“I’ve poured my heart, sweat and tears into this shop,” Scalf said.
But that dream was shaken last month when thieves broke into Xtreme Motorsports on Clarksville Pike.
“A lot of the giving and niceness has been struck as a weakness,” Scalf said. “Some people have taken advantage of that and stolen from me and broken into the shop.”
Scalf said the break-in caused more than $5,000 in damage and nearly $30,000 in stolen dirt bikes and ATVs — all of them belonging to customers.
“It’s so difficult for me because there’s five or six individuals whose bikes were stolen, and I didn’t have insurance,” he said. “That’s a fault on me as a business owner, being young and dumb. That’s completely my fault.”
Scalf said his security cameras weren’t working at the time. He filed a police report but also began searching on his own, eventually spotting one of the stolen bikes in North Nashville.
“We went driving around Nashville for two, three days and eventually we found a bike over off McDaniels Street,” he said.
Scalf said he called police, but officers arrived after he located the bike. Metro Police later obtained a search warrant for the property but did not find any other stolen items.
“I understand the police have a lot they deal with, but I feel like the situation could’ve been handled a bit better,” Scalf said.
Despite the financial blow, Scalf said he’s determined to make things right for his customers — even if it means selling everything he owns.
“At the end of the day, I’d rather people be happy with me and have a good name in everyone’s mouth than for someone to say, ‘Don’t go up there. I had a bike stolen and the dude said there was nothing he could do,’” he said.
Scalf is asking the public to keep an eye out for the missing bikes.
Metro Police are also reminding people to write down serial numbers and VINs for all property in case items are ever stolen. The investigation remains ongoing.
If you’d like to help support Scalf and his shop, he's launched a GoFundMe.
This story was reported by reporter Aaron Cantrell and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Aaron and our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy
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