Tech / Special Interest → Automotive > Used Jeep was police vehicle, and.....

Used Jeep was police vehicle, and.....

As time goes by, I'm finding one thing after another that's odd about my 2007 Jeep Grand Cherokee that I bought in Nov of 2012, with 55K miles. It runs fine actually, except for the surpentine belt pullys hiss like crazy. Here are some things that I noticed, in increasing level of concern:

**Grooves cut in the plastic molding around the rear glass lift-gate (to route wires?)

**Large access hole bored into the flat storage compartment in the rear storage area

**Wires that connect to the back of the headlights look like they've been cut & put back together with household electrical tape

**There's an aftermarket red wire attached to the +POS battery terminal, with an in-line fuse holder, with a 30A fuse in it. Wire disappears thru the fire-wall, into passenger compartment

**Today, when replacing the floor light under the steering column, I pulled down the access pannel under the steering wheel. Theres a foreign after-market metal black box with lots of wires running into it. It's haphazzardly tied to some metal brace with plastic zip-ties. Some of the wires go up behind the ignition. All the wires that come out of this box are secured with household electrical tape which is falling off. My guess, is that this is a relay of some sort that the red/blue police lights are attached to. --All of which have been removed.

**When I first bought the vehicle, when dew was on the windows, you could see that there used to be a decal of a huge hand-grenade (about 1foot high) on one of the rear side windows.

**On the other rear-side window, when there was dew on the window, there used to be a decal of the word, "AVENGER" on the window.

YES, all this is true - I"m not making this up. My only concern is that if any part of my ignition fails, and the mechanic take one look at the mystery-wiring connected to the rear of the ignition, will they tell me to take the Jeep back, saying they won't repair it...? I know a few people in this group have owned / managed garages before, would YOU try to repair a wiring / electrical issue, if you saw all that aftermarket wiring in place?

Keep in mind too that it may have originally been a siezed vehicle that they converted into a police vehicle (may explain the decals and some of the hack jobs)
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This Space for Rent...

The things you describe are not uncommon to find on a used police vehicle (I've owned 2 in the past). They are leftovers from various lights, flashers, radio gear and such that have been removed before the vehicle was sold.

OP here: My friend was trying to scare me -- he was asking me if the Jeep smelled like pot when I bought it. His parents bought a station wagon back in the 70s, used, in a quick-n-dirty sale from one of those guys with a plaid sports coat with huge lapels. It smelled like pot, and had a pile of broken auto-glass under the seat.