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Jacksonville man injured trying to stop car thief

A man was injured after he jumped on the roof of his car -- to try to stop a thief from taking off with it.

For the Bossardet family, it’s been a tough couple of days.

First, both of their cars were rummaged through -- and their spare keys stolen -- on Thursday. On Friday, Matthew Bossardet woke up to a thief in his car.

He heard a car door slam over a baby monitor and walked outside to find a thief inside his car.

"I got to the side of the car tried to bang on the window to scare him out,” said Bossardet.

When that didn’t work, he tried to get the thief to stop the car.

"I stepped in front of the car -- not even thinking -- and he gunned it,” Bossardet said.

That’s when Bossardet said he had three choices: Jump left, jump right -- or onto the hood.

"I just panicked and jumped onto the hood and grabbed on as best as I could. He popped the curb and that's when I fell off," said Bossardet.

Bossardet didn't break any bones, but road rash covers his body.

Action News Jax Crime and Safety Expert Ken Jefferson said you should never try to stop a crime in progress because the thief could be armed.

"Try to get a good description of the person driving the car, what they're wearing because they do a pretty good job at tracking car thieves down," said Jefferson.

Jefferson also said to make sure your car doors are always locked and don’t keep spare keys in your car.

Bossardet said his car was found a couple blocks over after a neighbor messaged them through Facebook and the car had two flat tires.

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