Teen, 2 Young Adults Charged After Breaking Into 50 Vehicles Across Howard County

HOWARD COUNTY, MD — A teenager and two young men from Baltimore have been arrested after police say they broke into 20 vehicles in Ellicott City and another 30 vehicles in Columbia on Christmas Eve.

Howard County Police shared a video on social media detailing how they arrested the suspects in the area of Route 100. Just before 5 a.m., police were called to a neighborhood in Ellicott City for a report of a rash of car break-ins. Officers spied a vehicle leaving the scene and pursued it, the video showed.

After the brief vehicle chase, police say the suspects' car, which also was stolen from Laurel, crashed. The three suspects hopped out of the stolen crashed car and took off. They were tracked by a drone using a thermal camera, which helped police find the suspects hiding in brushy areas near the highway.

Police arrested 19-year-old Jan Carlos Arita, 18-year-old Anthony Alvarenga-Barrera and a 16-year-old from Baltimore. They have been charged with motor vehicle theft and several counts of malicious destruction of property, according to authorities.

The two adults were charged and posted bail Christmas Eve and appeared before a judge Dec. 26. Police didn't release any additional information about the teen suspect.

"On the day before Christmas, people had their windshields broken, items stolen out of their vehicles," Seth Hoffman with the Howard County Police Department told CBS News. "So really, they were responsible for a lot of heartache during the holiday season, and quickly, within hours, we were able to arrest them."