HIT AND RUN
• Deputies are looking for the driver of a stolen truck who crashed head-on into a van early this morning at Harrison Avenue and Foron Road in Centralia. Aid and the sheriff’s office called about 4:50 a.m. learned the driver of a white 1987 GMC truck had been turning right onto Harrison into the wrong lane when he ran into the van, according to the sheriff’s office. The truck driver fled on foot and could not be found even after a police dog track, according to Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown. The van’s driver, a 53-year-old Rochester resident, was taken to Providence Centralia Hospital with minor injuries, responders said. The pickup truck had been stolen sometime earlier in the night from Van Wormer Street in Centralia, Brown said. Brown is asking anyone with information about the truck or its driver to call 911 or Lewis County Crime Stoppers.
DRUGS AT GREEN HILL
• Chehalis police were called yesterday to Green Hill School where authorities said one of their residents was found in possession of a small amount of marijuana. The 16-year-old being held in the state juvenile detention facility didn’t have anything to say about where it came from, police detective Sgt. Rick McNamara said. The teen was arrested and then released since he’s already in the custody of Green Hill, McNamara said. How drugs could have gotten inside Green Hill is a good question, McNamara said. Police have found that sometimes it could be brought in, mailed in or even tossed over the fence, he said. The case will be referred for a possible felony charge of possession of a controlled substance in a prison facility.
ATTEMPTED BURGLARY
• Two 16-year-old Chehalis boys were arrested yesterday after they allegedly climbed over a fence and tried to get in through the side door of a home on the 2000 block of Jackson Highway in Chehalis yesterday. A deputy was called about 11:30 a.m. about prowlers in a backyard who apparently ran when they were startled by a resident and her neighbor, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office. Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown said one was found walking up the road and the other returned to the scene. They were arrested and booked into Lewis County Juvenile Detention for attempted burglary, Brown said.
COMPUTER THEFT
• Centralia police were called about 4 p.m. yesterday about a laptop computer stolen from the room of a patient at a nursing home on the 1300 block of Alexander Street.
• A Dell laptop computer and an iPad were reported stolen from a home on the 1400 block of Oxford Avenue in Centralia last night. Police, called just after 8 p.m., could find no signs of forced entry, according to the Centralia Police Department.
WRECKS
• A 29-year-old Mossyrock man reportedly escaped injury when he lost control of his car yesterday on Cinebar Road and wrecked it into a ditch. A deputy responding around noontime reported the Chevrolet Cobalt sustained major damage to its front end, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office.
• The Washington State Patrol reports the driver of the car that wrecked Tuesday morning on Interstate 5 south of Chehalis was Manuel L. Lara-Fregoso, 57, of Onalaska. Lara-Fregoso was northbound near milepost 73 about 10 a.m. when he lost control of his vehicle and hit the center barrier before crossing all three lanes to the shoulder where he struck a light pole and then a tree, according to the state patrol. The 1997 Chevrolet was described as totaled. Lara-Fregoso was treated and has been released from the hospital.
Tags: By Sharyn L. Decker, news reporter