THRILLING CAR CHASE

Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 145, 21 June 1941, Page 6

THRILLING CAR CHASE

SYDNEY SENSATION

YOUNG GIRL ARRESTED

(0.C.)

SYDNEY, June 18.

An 18-year-old Sydney girl shared a wild adventure with three young men which ended in a car cha c through Sydney suburbs, and, for her, arrest.

The girl had gone with the men to Wollongong, 50 miles south of Sydney, where they stole a doctor's car. The number of the car was recognised by Constables Williamson and Beauchamp, of the Safety Bureau, as the car was passing through Auburn, an outer Sydney suburb, and they gave chase at 70 miles an hour. At first the fugitives tried to shake off pursuit by taking hair-raising turns down side streets. Then they tried to outspeed the police along Parramatta Road, an arterial road to the city.

Constable Beauchamp, driving the police car, kept the other car in sight while Constable Williamson maintained a two-way radio communication with the police wireless station. He gave a running commentary of the chase as they dashed through each suburb. The wireless station passed on the information to other patrol cars, so that as the chase neared the city, five cars were converging on the one area.

At a busy intersection the car which was being pursued drove at 60 miles an hour against the traffic lights, narrowly missing a car which was crossing with the lights. Thp police, who are instructed in such cases not to involve others in risk of injury, slowed down, and the car they were chasing increased its lead. At this stage another police car joined the hunt, and the two gradually made up the leeway.

After several narrow escapes from accident, the fugitive car swung into a side street. The police, close pehind, saw three men and a girl jump out and run through a gate. In the chase that followed, the police arrested the girl. She was charged later with having illegally used a car, but refused to name her companions. They were strangers to her, she said.