Car wound up inside a Taco Bell at 3 a.m. — then the driver vanished, NY officials say

A car wound up halfway inside a Taco Bell around 3 a.m. — then its driver vanished, New York fire officials said.

Three Taco Bell employees were working when the car drove into the window of the fast food restaurant in the early hours of Nov. 21, leaving a wake of damage, in Long Island, New York, the Islip Fire Department said in a news release.

The driver fled the partly destroyed Taco Bell on Bay Shore’s Main Street around 3:20 a.m. before authorities arrived, a Suffolk County police spokesperson told McClatchy News in an emailed statement.

After an investigation, police located and arrested Jared Higgins, 29, of Bay Shore, hours later at 2:15 p.m.

Images released by the fire department show the entire window of the store’s west side wall was taken out from the crash, leaving shards of glass scattered throughout the floor inside alongside broken tables and overturned chairs.

The three employees were left uninjured from the unexpected 3 a.m. commotion, according to the release.

Higgins was charged with leaving the scene of a crash with property damage, police said.

McClatchy News has reached out to the fire department for further comment.

This story was originally published November 22, 2021 at 8:21 AM with the headline "Car wound up inside a Taco Bell at 3 a.m. — then the driver vanished, NY officials say."

Julia Marnin

McClatchy DC

Julia Marnin covers courts for McClatchy News, writing about criminal and civil affairs, including cases involving policing, corrections, civil liberties, fraud, and abuses of power. As a reporter on McClatchy’s National Real-Time Team, she’s also covered the COVID-19 pandemic and a variety of other topics since joining in 2021, following a fellowship with Newsweek. Born in Biloxi, Mississippi, she was raised in South Jersey and is now based in New York State.