A man accused of following a woman from a downtown gas station and robbing her was arrested early Friday after a vehicle pursuit that ended with him crashing into a porch, Fort Wayne police said.
On Tuesday, police released surveillance video of the man, which generated multiple tips regarding his identity. But before detectives found the man, identified as Justin M. Alexander, 33, of Fort Wayne, he led police on a chase that started about 1:10 a.m. Friday near West Jefferson Boulevard and Webster Street, police said.
About a mile from where the pursuit began, Alexander crashed into the porch of a house in the 700 block of Madison Street, and he surrendered to officers, police said.
The woman whom Alexander allegedly robbed told police a man followed her Monday morning as she drove south from the Shell station at Fairfield Avenue and West Jefferson Boulevard to a lot in the 2100 block of Fairfield. When she got out of her vehicle, the man approached her with a handgun, took her cash and drove away, a police report said.
Alexander was also wanted in connection with another robbery that occurred Monday morning. In that case, the BP gas station at 7418 S. Anthony Blvd. was robbed of cash and cigarettes, according to a police report.
Alexander was being held Friday at the Allen County Jail on preliminary charges of unlawfully possessing a handgun as a felon, auto theft, operating a vehicle as an unlicensed driver, two counts of resisting law enforcement and two counts of robbery. His bail was set at $74,000.
