Man nearly hit by car after interrupting car burglary

ATLANTA — A man says he caught a car burglar in the act, only to have the burglar try to run him down – with his own car.

"It was pretty scary, honestly. It's not every day you get rushed at by someone in a speeding car coming right at you," said burglary victim Harrison Bain.

Bain told Channel 2’s Carl Willis he was helping a friend with car trouble on Woodland Hills Avenue in the Underwood Hills community last Tuesday night when he caught a car burglar in the act.

His first instinct: stop him.

"The guy jumped in the car and kind of takes off and speeds right towards me and he clearly swerved over to try to hit me so I had to jump out of the way," Bain said.

"They weren't going to slow down. I mean, there was no hesitation. They were speeding off," said witness Trent Williamson.

In hindsight, Bain said he might not react the same way, especially with incidents that have happened in northwest Atlanta recently.

"In the Riverside community, people were actually shot, hurt pretty bad. So I’m thankful that nothing like that happened," Bain said.

Bain said his near miss is another reason to keep focus on petty crimes before they escalate to potentially deadly encounters and to possibly pay for extra security in addition to police patrols.

"I'd be willing to chip in a little bit of money to pay for somebody to come through. I don't want somebody getting hit or something worse to happen," Williamson said.

"I don't really know (what) the answer is but it (is) something that we have to deal with it as a community, kind of watch out for each other," Bain said.

Cox Media Group