BUFFALO TWP — Township police are looking for an unknown hit-and-run driver who fled in a stolen car Monday morning after rear-ending another vehicle on Route 356.

Also, state police are looking for a 16-year-old boy who escaped Monday morning from the Summit Academy reform school in Summit Township.

Investigators from both departments believe they may be looking for the same suspect.

“It’s definitely something were looking at,” said Buffalo Township police Sgt. Rick Healey.

Troopers were first notified at 6:15 a.m. of the Ohio boy who had made his getaway from the Summit Academy on Herman Road about 15 to 20 minutes earlier.

The youth, police said, had been placed at the reform school on a probation violation for charges of auto theft and domestic violence.

Police searched the area for an hour but could not find the young escapee, who was last seen running south on Herman Road toward the Herman fire hall.

At 8:40 a.m., Buffalo Township police were notified of a hit-and-run accident.

The victim was a 59-year-old woman from Natrona Heights, Allegheny County, who was on her way home after dropping off her dog at the Saxony Animal Clinic.

The woman was southbound on Route 356 and stopped at a red light at the intersection of Route 228, police said. That’s where the unknown suspect hit the back of her 2005 Volkswagen Jetta.

“She wasn’t injured but the accident jarred her pretty good,” Healey said. “It knocked the glasses off her face.”

The woman described the other driver as a young male, Healey said. The suspect went around her car and headed west on Route 228 in a red Subaru.

But the victim was not going to sit there. She took off after the hit-and-run driver in her damaged car.

“Her bumper was smashed in but the vehicle was drivable, obviously,” Healey said.

Police said the suspect tried to get away from the woman. But the woman was determined to keep up and get close enough to read the license plate number.

The young driver eventually turned into the Sarver Post Office in an apparent bid to lose the woman. But she also turned into the post office. That’s where she got the license plate and called 911 on her cell phone.

Meanwhile, the suspect resumed his getaway westbound on Route 228.

Healey ran the Subaru’s plate number and contacted the owner, who had no idea her car had been stolen.

The car was taken while parked on Bonniebrook Road, less than a mile from Summit Academy.

The thief apparently had little trouble taking the vehicle after finding the keys in it, said state police Cpl. Timothy Morando.

Buffalo Township police and troopers searched two hours for the hit-and-run suspect or any sign of the stolen car but came up empty.

Healey and Morando said it would be a strange set of coincidences for their cases not to be connected.

Police believe the Summit Academy escapee could be trying to get home to the Cleveland area.

He is described as white, 5 feet, 2 inches tall and about 130 pounds. He has short brown hair, brown eyes and tattoos on his right forearm.

He was last seen wearing a gray Summit Academy shirt and khaki pants.