GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — The Grand Rapids Police Department is investigating more than a dozen reports of stolen cars in the past 48 hours.
One of those cases led to multiple crashes on the city's west side Friday afternoon. A neighbor shared home surveillance camera footage with 13 ON YOUR SIDE, which captured two of the crashes.
The stolen Hyundai blew a stop sign and hit an oncoming car on Alpine Avenue Northwest around 2:45 p.m. before it smashed into an apartment building on the corner of Crosby Street Northwest.
"You could hear the tires on the car screeching, and then I felt the impact. And it shook the building," Danett Terry, a building resident, says.
She had just put her daughters down for a nap when she felt the crash's impact on the front of her building. When she went outside to check it out, she saw at least one person exit the stolen Hyundai and get away.
Terry also saw a family inside the car that was hit.
"Things were going so fast. And when the lady started trying to get the baby, she kept saying 'My baby!' That's when I just decided let me see if they're okay, and how can how can I help them?" she says.
Grand Rapids police say the suspects got out of the stolen Hyundai and got into another stolen car, only to get into another crash less than half a mile away in front of Harrison Elementary School.
"The police officer when he got here, he said, 'Yeah, it was a stolen vehicle. We had been following them. We know that it was stolen,'" Terry says.
No one was inside the front part of the building, and a construction crew had the damage patched up within a few hours.
Police say there have been nearly 1,000 car thefts and attempted thefts since this time last year.
"It's very nerve wracking, considering I've got two little ones. And when people are doing this type of stuff, it makes you wonder how safe can you be. I take (my daughters) for walks," Terry says. "I'm really concerned."
No one was hurt in these crashes and police are still looking for those involved.
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