A Brampton dad fended off a car thief who tried to take his SUV with a baby inside from the driveway of his home, and the whole incident was caught by surveillance camera.
Peel Regional Police say that just before 12:30 p.m. on Sunday, a man loaded his 10-month old baby into an SUV parked in his driveway, and went back into his home to fetch his second child and bring them to the car.
Surveillance video footage posted online shows a man dressed in black wearing a mask emerge from a black car parked on the street and approach the driver’s side door of the vehicle.
When the father emerged with his second child, he quickly notices the strange man in the driver’s seat of his SUV, and while holding his older child in his arms, opens the passenger’s side door of vehicle to confront him.
The suspect throws the car in reverse, sending it rolling down the driveway with the father – and his child – in the path of the open passenger’s side door.
The father then circles over to the driver’s side door and the suspect flees back to the waiting getaway vehicle.
Still engaged, the SUV slowly crawls up the driveway and strikes the home’s garage door.
Police say nobody was injured in the incident and they are working to identify the suspect.
“We are all very happy these circumstances turned out the way they did and nobody was physically injured,” Const. Sarah Patten told CP24 on Wednesday afternoon. “We do not recommend for anyone to leave their vehicle unattended and doors unlocked. It does take mere seconds for someone to jump in that seat and take off with your vehicle.”
Patten said that the investigation into the incident is “active and fluid” and that investigators are working to identify both suspects, including the getaway driver.
She said that carjackings have unfortunately “skyrocketed” in Peel this year with 22 of them occurring so far in 2022 compared to eight during the same time period in 2021.
“Coming outside and seeing a stranger sitting in the drive seat of your vehicle is terrifying enough. But the thought that his 10-month old child was in the back seat…” she said.
