There were two more major stolen vehicle crashes over the weekend in Madison.
Police spokesman Joel DeSpain says in one case, a thirteen year old driver crashed into a light pole and bailed on a burning car, leaving his two friends inside to be arrested.
“Lo and behold, while we were at the hospital with them, the driver shows up, though he’s claiming at this point that he was in a bicycle crash and he wasn’t driving a car. Which our police officers astutely believed was not the truth.”
In another case, a stolen car was stopped using stop sticks on John Nolen Drive on the way to the Capitol.
DeSpain says they see the same groups of youths all the time.
“You know, we’ve been making a lot of arrests, but the problem is that there doesn’t seem to be something in the system right now that’s a deterrent that’s working to keeping these kids from repeating this criminal behavior.”
People need to stop making it easy for thieves, says DeSpain.
“Lock the car when it’s warming up at the very least, or just go to work in a cold car. Because these young people have shown that they’re not quitting at this point.”