Finksburg man released on auto-theft charge rearrested
Finksburg man released on auto-theft charge rearrested — for car theft
A Finksburg, Md., man liberated from custody after being charged Tuesday with motor vehicle theft was arrested for allegedly stealing another car within minutes of his release, according to Washington County District Court records.
Michael Bruce Crockett, 36, was charged with unlawful taking of a motor vehicle, failure to demonstrate his license to police and two traffic violations in the very first case. He was released on his own recognizance.
Crockett was then charged with unlawful taking of a motor vehicle and theft of $1,000 to $Ten,000 in the 2nd incident, court records said.
Albeit he was released on individual recognizance on the very first charges, his bond was originally set at $15,000 in the 2nd case, court records said.
Assistant State’s Attorney Leon Debes asked District Court Judge Terry A. Myers to set a higher bail, noting that Crockett allegedly stole a vehicle within ten minutes of being released from custody on initial charges of stealing a car.
Myers then set bail at $80,000. Crockett declined to be represented by the Office of the Public Defender during his bond-review hearing.
At 12:40 p.m. Tuesday, Hagerstown police were looking for Crockett, who was reportedly suicidal, according to the statement of probable cause.
Crockett was driving a Honda Accord reported stolen in Baltimore, and his cellphone was tracked to an area near Pennsylvania and Northern avenues, the charging documents said.
An officer spotted the car pass him at high speed on Northern Avenue and weave in and out of traffic before being stopped in a parking lot on Shank Farm Way, the documents said.
Crockett told police that the car belonged to a friend’s gf, and he had taken it that morning, the documents said.
Before leaving Central Booking, Crockett told police “he was not going to kill himself,” but had said things that made friends and family believe that he might, the documents said.
Crockett was released from custody at the Washington County Sheriff’s Office compound at five hundred Western Maryland Parkway at 11:08 p.m., according to the 2nd charging documents filed by the sheriff’s office.
At 11:13 p.m., a man at Rampf Molds Industries, ninety Western Maryland Parkway, reported his two thousand Pontiac Sunfire missing. The man told authorities that the keys were inwards the car, but that a key was not needed to embark the vehicle, the documents said.
Hagerstown police were then called to Wal-Mart for a report of a theft involving Crockett, the documents said.
Crockett went into the store, told an employee he was freshly hired and asked where the employee locker room was. A manager went into the locker room and spotted a man wearing a Wal-Mart vest carrying an armload of items, the documents said.
The manager realized the man was not an employee and asked him his name. Crockett gave the manager his real name and left the store. Surveillance movie displayed he had arrived and left in the stolen Sunfire, the documents said.
It was unclear in the documents how Crockett was taken into custody on the 2nd set of charges.