Cops: Speeding teen driver crashes into Libertyville home

A Libertyville teen already facing a street racing charge crashed into a home just after midnight Saturday after eluding police, according to authorities.

At about 12:30 a.m. Sunday, police spotted a vehicle traveling at a high rate of speed on Route 176 before the vehicle turned onto South Fourth Avenue and accelerated rapidly blowing through multiple stop signs, according to police.

Officers lost sight of the vehicle but found it about a mile away in a yard on the 800 block of Valley Park Drive with extensive front end damage, according to a police report.

Police found Andrew T. Gregory inside the damaged vehicle, which had driven off the roadway and struck the side of a house, causing structural damage, officials said. The residents of the home were inside but were not injured, according to police.

Gregory, 19, of the 600 block of South Dymond Road, suffered minor injuries in the crash and was taken to Advocate Condell Medical Center, according to police.

He was charged with aggravated fleeing and eluding, criminal damage to property, two counts of speeding, three counts of disobeying a stop sign, reckless driving and driving too fast for conditions.

Less than a month earlier Gregory was charged with street racing and reckless driving following a report of a traffic crash involving a light pole, according to police reports.

Based on two eyewitness accounts, police cited Gregory, who was 18 at the time, and Andrew M. Hartung, 19, following the crash on the 100 block of Winchester Road at 6:37 p.m.

Hartung, of the 600 block of South Dymond Road in Libertyville, was charged with street racing, reckless driving and failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident, according to police.

Both teens were released on $1,500 personal recognizance bonds and were due in court Tuesday on the April charges.

A court date for Gregory on his most recent charges had not been set as of Tuesday.