You belong in a Sandman thinking like that!

If the tags are removed, the vehicle is still a Sandman. In a few models you can even still tell it was a Sandman without the tags. However in the act of someone stealing your tags, what they have done is not stolen the identity of the Sandman (they cannot use it, you still have the chassis rails), but they have stolen 75% of the value of your Sandman. They have turned say a $15,000 vehicle into a $4,000 one. If that makes sense.