ST. LOUIS — Police arrested four juveniles — including one who had escaped from a juvenile detention center — during two separate incidents Tuesday.
According to a police source, two 14-year-olds and a 16-year-old were arrested during the first incident at around 4 a.m. Police said the teenagers were breaking into cars in a parking lot outside of the Enterprise Rent-A-Car lot on Washington Avenue. One of the victims told police his cell phone had been stolen from his car, and when he called it he heard it ringing within reach of where the teens were arrested.
Then, at around 7:30 a.m. at 14th Street and Cass Avenue in the Carr Square neighborhood, police arrested a 17-year-old who had escaped from the Hogan Street Regional Youth Center over the weekend and is now suspected in a carjacking, according to the source.
City officers were told by St. Louis County police that a vehicle taken in a carjacking had been spotted at the Preservation Square apartments in the Carr Square neighborhood. They found three male suspects inside the vehicle, who all ran when officers approached.
Officers caught one of them and found a gun. They learned he had warrants for his arrest related to an escape from the youth center, first-degree property damage and assault of a special victim.
According to a police report, three 17-year-old boys escaped from the center at around 1:10 a.m. Sunday morning. An employee told police the boys lured him into a second-floor restroom, where they held him down, assaulted him and took his set of facility keys. They then locked him in the restroom, broke a window and ran out of the building.
The escape is the latest in a string of incidents at the city’s juvenile detention centers.
