Williams Lake RCMP were kept busy Saturday, Jan. 7 in hot pursuit of two stolen pickup trucks that both ended up being set on fire.
At around 6:30 p.m. Williams Lake resident Bonnie Deno and her family were en route to a Williams Lake Stampeders hockey game when they saw the first truck fully engulfed in flames on Proctor Street near Broadway Avenue North.
She called 9-1-1 and said it was lucky the RCMP and Williams Lake Fire Department responded quickly because if the fire had spread it could have impacted vehicles parked at a nearby car dealership.
Cpl. Brett Squire of the Williams Lake RCMP confirmed the pickup truck had been stolen out of Kamloops, but no arrests had been made.
Within a few hours a report of a second stolen truck was made to the RCMP.
Ty Thurow was at the Stampeders game with friends and when he went outside after the game he discovered his 1999 White Dodge 2500 was gone from the Cariboo Memorial Recreation Complex parking lot.
“My friend arrived late to the game at about 8 p.m. and saw my truck still in the parking lot,” Thurow told the Tribune.
After reporting the theft to the RCMP, Thurow and his dad spied the truck at a gas station in the 1200 block of Broadway Avenue South and alerted RCMP.
“The driver jumped a big curb at the gas station and took off,” he said, adding the truck headed toward 150 Mile House with RCMP in pursuit.
Forty-five minutes later the truck was seen exiting the 150 Mile House area, minus Thurow’s eight-foot aluminum sled deck.
At 8:30 a.m. Sunday morning, Thurow got a call from the RCMP informing him his truck was found burned on a private road near the Williams Lake Regional Airport.
He later found the sled deck abandoned on a driveway off Highway 97 near 140 Mile House.
Thurow had only had the truck on the road for about two months.
He bought it in rough shape and poured a lot of work and money into fixing it up.
“It’s only good for scrap metal now. There was nothing left of it,” he said, noting he expects to be at a loss after his claim is settled with ICBC.
RCMP Cpl. Squire confirmed Monday no arrests have been made in relation to either of the stolen trucks.
monica.lamb-yorski@wltribune.com
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