KINGSBRIDGE — Officials arrested a convicted carjacker who they say crashed an NYPD patrol car that he took for joyride after an officer left it unlocked in the precinct stationhouse parking lot with the keys inside, police said.
Ruben Fernandez, 31, of the Upper West Side has been charged with grand larceny, reckless endangerment and criminal mischief for stealing a police car from the parking lot of the 50th Precinct in Kingsbridge around 6:20 a.m. on Sunday, according to the NYPD.
He drove the car for about two miles before crashing it into four parked cars outside of 2300 Sedgwick Ave.
He then abandoned the car and fled in a black Lincoln Town Car going west on Fordham Road, police said.
The squad car had been left unlocked with the keys inside, and both the officer who left it in the parking lot and the desk sergeant who was on duty will be disciplined, according to the NYPD.
Fernandez has 21 priors for charges including kidnapping and reckless driving, and he was previously convicted of stealing an idling Nissan Maxima in Queens in 2008 while a mother and her 14-month-old child were in the backseat, officials said.
Fernandez stole the Nissan after the woman's husband pulled up to a dry cleaners and got out of the car, and the heist ended when he crashed it into a parked car, according to the Queens District Attorney's Office.
He was incarcerated on charges of robbery and unlawful imprisonment following the Queens carjacking and was released on parole on May 24, according to state records.
He was arraigned on Wednesday and had bail set at $100,000, and he is due back in court on Oct. 28, according to the Bronx District Attorney's Office.
Fernandez's attorney Neville Mitchell said that his client maintains his innocence, and he looks forward to defending him in court.
