Seven people have been arrested after a dramatic car chase in Melbourne overnight, where police allege stolen cars reached speeds of up to 150km/h and at one point continued driving on two wheels.
Police first spotted a BMW wagon with stolen plates “travelling at high speeds” on the Monash Freeway in Dandenong at about 2am on Friday.
A police helicopter then tracked the car to Narre Warren where a Mercedes joined the BMW.
Police said the BMW was dumped in Mullum Mullum Tunnel and the people inside jumped in the Mercedes instead.
Police then deployed stop-sticks – spikes designed to penetrate tyres and deflate them in high-speed pursuits – in Heidelberg, but the car continued travelling on two wheels towards the Eastern Freeway in Kew.
The Mercedes came to a stop and seven people inside the car were arrested.
Dramatic footage from Nine showed more than a dozen police cars with their lights on spread across the freeway near Burke Road.
It is alleged the BMW and Mercedes were both stolen during recent aggravated burglaries and the cars have now been seized.
The officers who first spotted the BMW were on patrol as part of Operation Trinity, which launched in April.
The citywide operation is dedicated to targeting aggravated burglaries and associated car thefts, which Victoria Police said had “increased markedly” after the pandemic.
The increase has been mostly driven by youth offenders targeting unlocked homes, with the intention of stealing car keys, police said.
The operation has led to more than 800 arrests in three months.
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Senior Sergeant Courtney Guerin told A Current Affair, who recently went along with Operation Trinity officers on their night shift, that offenders were constantly stealing luxury cars for fun.
“Once they lose the car they then have to go commit another serious offence and get a new one,” she said.
The latest Victorian crime data released this month showed the number of children committing criminal offences had risen by nearly 50 per cent.
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