Stolen school bus taken for destructive joyride that damages four vehicles

A stolen Muscogee County school bus is stolen from the Columbus Roberts Center and taken for a joyride that damaged four cars and cost thousands of dollars of damages.

"It pushed my truck into her truck and the truck into the Pontiac right here,” Patricia Williams says of her new Chevy Tahoe that was damaged after a hit-and-run with stolen school bus 675.

The Williams' family says they had just returned to their Farley home residence Thursday night when they heard something sounding like a gunshot outside.

"Next we heard like a train was...pulling something. So I get up and went to the door...and that's when I saw the bus...just in the side of my car.”

Police say around 9 PM someone broke into the Columbus Roberts Center bus yard, stole one and took it for a joyride around the block that ended with a four car hit-and-run involving one family’s vehicles and two vehicles purchased less than a month ago.

According to the accident report the driver of the school lost control making a right-hand turn hit the driver’s side of the Ford and then hit that maroon Tahoe pushing it onto the curb and onto the sidewalk.

"If it hadn't been negligence and the keys were never left in the bus those kids would have never...got in that bus and drove it,” Williams says.

The Muscogee County School District says normally buses are locked in a gated area at the end of each day, but says on-going work at the Roberts Center may have led to the fence not being properly secured and they are investigating.

Ellarein Holston has been driving buses for 16 years and says she's never heard anything like this before. "Normally they would take their keys with them unless they are not going to be there the next day and then they would leave them in a secure place."

Police haven't made any arrests but people in the neighborhood told News Three the culprits may be 12-to-14 year-old Marshall Middle School Students who live in the area. They say they saw at least two young men wearing white shirts enter the property, heard the engine start then saw a bus driving down Shephard Drive. After the crash, they claim the boys took off running.

"They could've killed someone out there on the road or hurt themselves. You know it could've been [worse] worser than this,” Williams says.

Police and the school district are investigating the incident. Authorities are reviewing surveillance video from the bus to see if the suspects were caught on tape.

Editor's Note: Updated with pictures of the damaged bus sent to Muscogee County School District Director of Communications Valerie L. Fuller Monday (2/6/12) morning.  Fuller says she was told the bus is at the bus shop.