GILROY
– An eBay auction for
”
Arnold Schwarzeneg-ger’s
”
Indian Chief motorcycle was not authorized by the
actor-turned-governor, and his staff is investigating the matter, a
Schwarzenegger spokesperson said Friday.
GILROY – An eBay auction for “Arnold Schwarzeneg-ger’s” Indian Chief motorcycle was not authorized by the actor-turned-governor, and his staff is investigating the matter, a Schwarzenegger spokesperson said Friday.
“It may be the one that was up for auction in Las Vegas,” Schwarzenegger spokesperson Terri Carbaugh said Friday. The governor did put an Indian motorcycle he owns up at a Las Vegas auction on Feb. 5, 6 and 7, Carbaugh said, but it never sold.
Later on Friday, the advertisement for the red-and-black 2000 Indian Chief – ostensibly owned by Schwarzenegger – was pulled from eBay by the seller, Auto Fitness-Classbenz, a Los Angeles luxury car dealer specializing in German imports.
Classbenz dealer Mauri, who would not give his last name, said he pulled the ad because the governor’s staff asked him to. The governor had previously asked him to sell the motorcycle, he said.
“It isn’t clear to me to whether they decided to keep the bike or not,” Mauri said.
The auction was not scheduled to end for four more days.
Mauri insisted the motorcycle belongs to Schwarzenegger, for whom he said he was acting as an agent.
“I was doing this as a favor to them,” Mauri said.
In the ad, Classbenz claimed the motorcycle is personally signed by the governor.
Carbaugh said the governor still owns the Indian that didn’t sell in Las Vegas. She did not know whether he owns other motorcycles as well.
The Gilroy-based, now-defunct Indian Motorcycle Company gave a 2000 Chief to Schwarzenegger free of charge to promote the brand’s return after more than 45 years. Indian was the first U.S. motorcycle brand. Indians were made in Springfield, Mass. until the company went under in 1953. The next line of Indian bikes in the U.S. were manufactured in Gilroy in 1999.
