A BIZARRE car chase involving a caravan on a Doncaster motorway could have been the highlight of an episode of TV's Traffic Cops if the cameras had been there to capture it.
But a judge at Doncaster Crown Court had to make do with a verbal account of the dangerous pursuit along the M18 from Lakeside to Armthorpe, which brought an end to a man's £100,000 thieving spree.
Serial criminal Andrew Paul Vance, aged 22 – who
has stolen hundreds of vehicles – had been out of prison only three days when he took the caravan from the drive of a house in Bessacarr, hitching it to four-wheel drive vehicle, and headed for the motorway.
But the way it was being driven attracted the attention of a police patrol and they followed it because it was snaking across the road due to its speed, said prosecutor Susan Evans.
They signalled for it to stop but Vance carried on. When another police car joined the chase and tried to block him, Vance braked sharply, forcing the following police car to an emergency stop, the court was told.
An officer who got out of his car to try to detain the driver narrowly escaped being run over as Vance drove off again before leaving the M18 at junction four and heading down Holmewood Lane, Armthorpe.
The caravan was then driven across two ploughed fields before Vance unsuccessfully tried to unhitch it.
Then he drove across a ditch into a wood and abandoned it.
By this time the police helicopter had been called up and Vance, of no fixed address, was caught in a quarry.
After being taken to the police station, he decided to clear his slate and admitted hundreds more offences committed over the previous year, including the theft of a JCB excavator from the Moorends health centre while it was under construction.
Vance was jailed for a total of three years after pleading guilty to two theft charges and dangerous driving with the caravan. He was also banned from driving for two years.
The judge took into consideration 227 other offences, mostly thefts of and from vehicles, in which Vance took property worth around £110,000. He also has previous convictions for theft and dangerous driving.
Defence counsel Guy Wyatt said Vance deserved credit for his "enthusiastic assistance to police in clearing up offences."
He added: "He accepts he was a prolific thief and he now wants to make a change in his life, but realises he must spend time in prison first."
Sentencing him, Judge Patrick Robertshaw told Vance he hoped he could now "go straight having wiped the slate clean with your monumental frankness."
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