TRURO — Driving north on Route 6 around midnight last Sunday, Shelby Zawaduk passed a car she could’ve sworn she recognized. Stopped by police just shy of Truro’s Stotts Crossing was a blue Toyota RAV4 that matched Zawaduk’s boyfriend’s family vehicle in make, model, and je-ne-sais-quoi. The car’s driver, though, was a stranger. Zawaduk shook off her premonition and continued north.
Back at Stotts Crossing, Joshua Scoullar, 27, with addresses in West Dennis and North Attleboro, was, according to Truro Patrol Officer Christopher Cheverie Jr.’s report, fidgeting. The blue Toyota RAV4 in which he’d pushed 70 miles per hour in a 50-mile-per-hour zone was his aunt’s, he told Cheverie. He’d just borrowed it to drive around and cool off. No, he didn’t have the registration, or his license. And no, he couldn’t remember Aunt April’s last name.
Some prodding from Cheverie and a database search revealed two things. One: the Toyota was registered to Provincetown’s Luster Packard Inc. Two: the Toyota’s driver was the distinctly unlicensed Scoullar, facing an active default warrant from Milford District Court for trespassing.
Cheverie told Scoullar what he knew; Scoullar dropped the Aunt April story. He had just been walking in Provincetown, he admitted, when he opened the car’s door and took it for a drive. Cheverie called a tow truck. But before it showed up, another vehicle arrived on scene. It was Zawaduk.
She’d arrived at her boyfriend Caleb Luster’s Provincetown house to learn that his family car was missing from its usual parking spot. Caleb had left it unlocked with the keys inside, he told her. The couple set out on a Toyota-hunt — first stop, Stotts Crossing in Truro.
Luster reclaimed his car; police arrested Scoullar. The Truro police charged him with the unlicensed operation of a motor vehicle and speeding. The Provincetown police charged him with larceny under $1,200 (a $50 bill Luster had left in his glovebox was gone), and larceny of a motor vehicle.
Here’s where things get complicated.
Scoullar proved no stranger to the Provincetown P.D.: two Sundays ago, on Oct. 25, Officer Samantha Voltolini arrested him for breaking and entering with intent to commit a misdemeanor and vandalism.
Roy Renwick, an employee at the Provincetown Inn, had been checking the property (closed since Oct. 20) when he saw Scoullar inside room 173, lying on the bed. When Voltolini arrived on scene, Scoullar told her that he’d been staying in the hotel for “one or two days.”
Scoullar was arraigned in Orleans District Court on Oct. 26 and released on personal recognizance. But these vehicular cases sent him back to Orleans, where a more thorough perusal of his background revealed two open cases of larceny of a motor vehicle: one, from Aug. 20, in Attleboro District Court, the other, from May 4, in Fall River District Court.
Hearings in both of those cases allowed for Scoullar’s release on bail, under the condition that he not commit any new offenses. His Nov. 1 exploits violated those conditions.
As a result, at his Nov. 2 arraignment, the Commonwealth moved to revoke Scoullar’s bail and hold him at the Barnstable County Correctional Facility. Judge Robert Welsh upheld the motion.
Scoullar will next appear in Orleans District Court for three separate pretrial hearings on Nov. 23. He is due in both Attleboro District Court and Fall River District Court on Jan. 29, 2021.
