In Texas, “Grand Theft Auto” is a video game, not a crime. Texas chose to adopt the offense of Unauthorized Use of a Motorized Vehicle to create a broad category of criminal offense that includes joyriding in stolen vehicles. Under the strict definition of theft, a person must take property with the intent to permanently deprive the owner. If a group of teenagers unlawfully decides to ‘borrow’ a car to ride around town for the night, and assuming you could prove had no intent to keep the car, they would escape criminal liability for theft.
Under the UUMV statute, the driver’s intent to return the car is absolutely irrelevant. The crime is committed when a person intentionally or knowingly operates another person’s car or boat or plane (or anything with a motor) without the owner’s consent. The offense is punished as a state jail felony.
he more interesting UUMV cases involve passengers in a stolen car and whether it is factually or legally possible for them to have operated the car. “Operate” is not defined in the penal code, and at least one Court of Criminal Appeals decision has not precluded passengers from being charged: “While driving does involve operation, operation does not necessarily involve driving…the totality of the circumstances must demonstrate that the defendant took action to affect the functioning of [the] vehicle.” See Denton v. State, 911 S.W.2d 388 (Tex.Crim.App. 1995). Similarly, the standard practice of law enforcement is to arrest everybody in the car under the theory of the law of parties. (create separate page). Many times this results in innocent people’s arrest who were picked up by a friend in a stolen car but did nothing to operate the car.