Okanagan RCMP detachments helped one another Monday morning to nab a suspect driving a stolen vehicle near Vernon.
Kelowna RCMP were alerted to a stolen 1990s GMC truck out of Alberta, hauling a B.C. flatdeck trailer carrying John Deere riding mowers Monday morning.
Lake Country officers spotted the vehicle on Highway 97 at around 4 a.m. and notified the Vernon detachment as the truck was heading northbound on the highway.
After a report the vehicle turned off the highway near Bailey Road, Vernon officers found the vehicle on Commonage Road and set up a spike belt, which was successfully deployed as the truck drove over the belt.
“The driver took off from the scene on foot but he was arrested a short time later, just before 5 a.m.,” said Vernon RCMP spokesperson Gord Molendyk.
The suspect, a 37-year-old West Kelowna man, was discovered to have been prohibited and suspended from driving a motor vehicle.
The man is expected to face charges of driving while prohibited – suspended, as well several charges of theft and possession of stolen property.
The truck, trailer and mowers were all discovered by police to have been stolen.
The value of the mowers was not known.
Molendyk said that as the file originated in Kelowna, officers from that detachment would be coming up to Vernon Monday to take possession of the stolen property.
