A fan's police car was recorded by Rockstar at Millbrook — could it appear in GTA 6?
A Crown Victoria in Warrington
Some GTA 6 fans look for the game in Miami's streets; Lukas Holmes is looking for his own car in the game. The 28-year-old British gamer, who lives in Warrington, Cheshire, has spent years convinced that a vehicle he owns was scanned and recorded by Rockstar Games — and that it could end up on the streets of Vice City.
Holmes told the BBC he had dreamed of owning an American squad car since he was five. In 2019, he imported a 2009 Ford Crown Victoria bought from the Warminster Township Police Department in Pennsylvania, shipping it across the Atlantic to the UK.
The Millbrook invitation
In early 2021 — almost a year before GTA 6 was officially announced — Holmes was invited to Millbrook Proving Ground in Bedfordshire, where a "big client from Edinburgh" wanted to spend time with the car. He says teams photographed the vehicle, placed microphones around it to capture sounds like doors opening and closing, and had a stunt driver take it around the site to record its engine.
He had his suspicions from the start. "I had my suspicions it was Rockstar when I was told it was a big client from Edinburgh, because that's where Rockstar North is," he said. "Once I found out it was Rockstar Games, I was like, it's got to be Grand Theft Auto." He later received an email from a member of Rockstar's audio team thanking him for his time. The developer did not respond when asked whether Millbrook had been used during the game's development.
95% similar
The Grand Theft Auto series has always used fictional vehicle brands — the closest equivalent to the Crown Victoria is the Vapid Stanier — but Holmes believes he has already spotted his car in the trailers: a green-and-white sheriff's vehicle with a similar light bar, spotlight and prisoner partition. "They are about 95% similar to what's on my car right now," he said.
He has booked the game's release date, November 19, off work and plans to check whether GTA 6's cars share his vehicle's distinctive engine sound. "I'll be jumping with joy if that's my car in the game!"
A car with a life of its own
The Crown Victoria has become something of a local celebrity. Holmes runs Rent-A-Vic, hiring the car out for media work to fund its upkeep, and used the Millbrook fee to replace its tyres and make it fully road-legal. He now takes it to proms, weddings and birthdays across Europe.
The story came full circle when a serving Warminster Township Police Department officer — who had seen Holmes's social media posts — arranged to meet him during a UK holiday. Holmes drove the car to York, where the officer immediately recognised it as "unit 7425", the exact car he had driven on shift years earlier.
Whether the Crown Victoria actually made it into GTA 6 remains unconfirmed — the recordings could just as easily have been for reference material. But with the game set in Rockstar's version of Florida, a car once driven by real Pennsylvania officers has a plausible shot at a digital afterlife in Vice City. Fans will find out on November 19.