The Ontario Provincial Police say officers have arrested a man accused of carrying out a recent crime spree that took place in parts of London, Middlesex County and Oxford County.
The incidents that led to his arrest began just after 6 a.m. last Tuesday when OPP officers were dispatched to a business on Highbury Avenue in Middlesex Centre to respond to a report of gas theft.
When an investigation showed the licence plates of the suspect vehicle did not match the vehicle itself, several other police forces became involved including London police. Investigators later learned the suspect vehicle was previously reported stolen out of Ingersoll while the license plates were stolen from another vehicle in London, police say.
Later that day, at around 12:45 p.m., police say officers “observed the vehicle” at a home on Rivers Road in South-West Oxford, however the vehicle in question was not recovered.
Police say the home had been broken into and a side-by-side vehicle had been stolen, but the stolen side-by-side vehicle was recovered “not far away”.
The suspect vehicle was found once more at 3 p.m. that day at a business plaza on Wellington Road in London. Two people inside the vehicle were arrested without incident, police said.
Police say officers found stolen property and a shotgun during a search of the vehicle.
A 35-year-old man of no fixed address faces eight charges including unauthorized possession of a firearm, break and enter of a place with intent to commit an indictable offence and several theft-related offences.
Police allege the 35-year-old “has been the subject of a multi-jurisdictional crime spree involving property crime, break and enters and vehicle thefts.”
The other person inside the vehicle, a 22-year-old London woman, faces seven similar charges.
Police say both of the suspects were held for a bail hearing in the Ontario Court of Justice.