'It's insane': Residents wake to crashed cars and police takedown on quiet Huron County street

Wrecked cars, and vehicle debris stretching as far as eye could see greeted residents of a quiet street in Goderich this morning.

"About 3:30ish this morning, we heard a loud bang. We came running to the front, and we [saw] this chaos," said Elgin Avenue resident, Annette McCarthy.

Her boyfriend's truck was one of seven parked vehicles struck and severely damaged by a stolen vehicle, as it sped down the quiet residential street around 4:30 this morning trying to flee police. One of three vehicles police believe were stolen by the suspect, in the wee hours of Friday morning.

"I see headlights coming west towards me and the lights going, and he hit one vehicle, started to flip, hit the curb, bounced back down, kicked the windshield about 3 to 4 times trying to get out. Cop came up. I yelled, he's kicking the windshield! So he stopped that. The cop said get out of the car. He wouldn't get out of the car. Cop said get out of the car. He tussled a little bit," said Elgin Avenue resident, Ashley Albrecht.

That's how the bizarre crime spree ended, with police taking a single male suspect into custody in the middle of Elgin Avenue.

It began around 2:30 am, when police say the male suspect smashed a window at a local car dealership, and stole keys for a Dodge SUV. They say he drove it dangerously around town, before it possibly ran out of gas or became disabled. He went back to the dealership, and allegedly stole a Dodge pickup truck, before breaking into a Tim Horton's on the east end of Goderich. A short time later, police believe he ran that truck into a curb on Kingston Street, disabling it. He then ran back to the dealership and stole another vehicle, driving it aggressively the opposite way around Goderich's downtown square, before ending up on Elgin Avenue, where he careened into seven parked vehicles, disabling the stolen vehicle so badly that police converged, and arrested him.

Damaged vehicles on Elgin Avenue in Goderich after a stolen vehicle crashed into as many as seven parked vehicles following an early morning crime spree, July 12, 2024 (Scott Miller/CTV News London)

"It's insane," said Albrecht. "It gets pretty speedy here, but nobody usually does car chases on the street, no."

While there was clearly an immense amount of damage done during this crime spree overnight in Goderich, residents say they are frankly amazed, but also appreciative that no one was injured.

"I just kept on hearing it from one side to another over the town, and then I'm like, I had a feeling, I said to myself, somebody is going to crash. And next thing you know, boom, and it echoed," said Albrecht.

As a result of this morning's occurences, a 32-year-old man is facing a long list of charges including dangerous driving, assaulting a peace officer, possession of methamphetamine, break and enter, and resisting arrest. Elgin Avenue reopened around 11 a.m., as the vehicle was taken away by police - an early morning none of the neighbourhood residents will forget.