02x01 - Carjack Chaos

[bunniefuu]

All right, that car just sped off.

This guy was completely out of

control and needed to be stopped.

All right, slowing down at 18th.

He's coming to carjack a Corvette.

Driving on the wrong side of the road.

We gotta get this guy stopped.

He's crazy, man.

He's gonna k*ll somebody.

Adrenaline's up. Heart rate's up.

You feel like you're in a video game.

We gotta get back up and

make sure he doesn't k*ll somebody.

Permission to PIT?

Take them out!

On March 6th,

I was on shift at the flight unit.

About 4:30 p.m. we received a call

of an altercation between two males

that ended up in one of the males

stealing the other male's vehicle.

Southbound on Douglas

It's important for a quick response,

being that it was

a robbery call and in progress.

I got a possible name for the

subject Kenneth Lunford,

L-U-N-F-O-R-D.

Either white or mixed male.

Eagle, what's the make

and model of the car?

It's a Chevy Malibu, red.

All right, I copy.

Even several miles out,

with the equipment that we have,

I'm able to start looking on the ground.

There's a red car here. Stopped

in traffic. Thank you, Control.

- Oh, they must have turned.

- I saw one going North

Are you 100 percent sure on that ID?

I see couple of red cars,

but they're not Chevy Malibus.

It can be a bit like

finding a needle in a haystack.

That just adds to

the pressures that are involved.

Eagle break, I think I got your car,

Southbound Fort Harrison

I could see the driver's door

flapping open and closed.

I'm confident the vehicle

is the one that we're looking for.

- Continuing South on Myrtle.

- How's his driving?

Extremely signal 12,

driver doors flapping in the wind.

Almost signal four,

running red light through Fairmount

You're on.

Just ran, Marshall. Still

signal 12. High rate of speed.

Given his aggressive driving

without any officers

actually in pursuit of him,

I wonder if he knows that we're

actually tracking him from the sky.

The speed limit

is around 35 miles an hour.

Patrol to units.

He's going, baby. Yeah.

Driving at this high rate

of speed is dangerous

because the other

drivers aren't expecting it.

This was a Sunday afternoon,

the beginning of spring break.

I know that there's a lot of people

here, especially out on the beach.

The BOLO says two doors,

but it's four door, correct?

It's going to be a four door.

As I'm hearing this go out over the

radio, I look towards the computer

and try to get information

as the BOLO is coming out,

so I know what I'm looking for.

Any type of call like this has the ability

to transition locations very quickly.

All right, coming up to Drew Street

and ran the red light at Drew Street.

Cut between two cars.

Through Cleveland, driving

on the wrong side of the road,

almost caused a head-on signal four.

- We gotta get this guy stopped.

- Yeah.

We gotta get this guy

stopped no matter what.

He's, he's crazy, man.

Gonna k*ll somebody.

Yeah, Eagle, I would qualify

this as extremely dangerous driving.

I'm starting to get closer,

closing that gap with the suspects.

I can hear the helicopter continuing

to call out the behavior of the car.

I've listened to him

a thousand times on the radio.

He's obviously calm

and collected, but you just

You can tell the inflection

in his voice is a bit different,

and he's a little more worked up.

This guy has to be

driving absolutely crazy.

- He was close to that motorcycle.

- Oh, my gosh, yes.

We gotta get sticks ahead of this

guy. He's going to k*ll someone.

I start to wonder, how far

is this guy really gonna go?

He's over the wrong side of the road,

coming up to West Bay on Clearwater Largo.

He's got a red light.

He ran the red light. I think he

just signal 4'd into this van.

He's going to be heading to the beach.

I think the driver door keeps coming open.

It is, it's flapping open.

He's bobbing and weaving through traffic.

Driving in the median.

High rate of speed.

All right, passing Bluff

View Drive and Harbor View Lane.

So he's committed towards the beach.

In Pinellas County, all of the

beaches are barrier islands.

There's only a certain

number of bridges to get there.

So a suspect can easily

find themselves trapped

on an island with no way out.

Still Westbound.

Car 48 to Eagle. He's all out,

no-one's pushing him. Ten-four.

I can't see anybody around him,

but he is extremely dangerous.

The suspect is driving

erratically with no one around him.

So in my head,

the first thing I'm thinking is

either alcohol, or drugs.

He's probably going to come South.

I'll try to get ahead of him with sticks.

We work out a plan for

my partner to set up stop sticks,

right at the city line on Gulf Boulevard,

and for me to go to the end of the

bridge the vehicle is coming over.

With knowing that there's

more deputies responding

and that they're getting closer,

it's making me more confident

that this is gonna get ended soon.

Past 6th Street, through

3rd Street, still Southbound.

I see the vehicle coming over

the bridge and it passes me.

Extremely fast.

I'm thinking,

my partner's safety is in jeopardy.

Still Southbound.

Around the deputy.

Still continuing high rate of speed.

Unfortunately, the suspect saw and

he swerved into oncoming traffic

and really increased his speed

to avoid those stop sticks.

He's missed the spikes.

Adrenaline's up, heart rate's up.

Like, this is as crazy

as the helicopter was saying.

He's in the median.

High rate of speed.

He's taking risks to get ahead of

me that I'm just not willing to take.

I need to really focus,

pay attention to what I'm doing,

because one mistake could be fatal.

All right, slowing down at 18th.

Looks like he's gonna bail at 18th.

I thought that he was looking for

a place to jump out and run on foot.

He's coming to carjack a Corvette.

I zoom in on the suspect to see

if maybe he's got a weapon.

Black male, blue shirt, blue jeans.

Him being able to successfully

carjack a Corvette

is very dangerous for us.

They sit much lower to the ground,

they are much faster than us,

and they have way better handling.

It will be nearly impossible

for me to keep up with him.

Rocky, can you get up there?

He's coming to carjack a Corvette.

So the first thing in my head is,

"All right, I need to hammer down.

I need to speed up.

I need to get there."

Rocky, can you get up there?

All right, that car just sped off.

As I start to close the gap.

I'm thinking, I can try to ram into him.

Or PIT it.

And as I pull up,

he's able to get into the vehicle

right as I'm attempting

to PIT him.

You miss the PIT by a couple of seconds.

It's so frustrating.

Control, he just passed by me.

He is Southbound on the Gulf

Boulevard. High rate of speed.

12th Avenue.

We need to get this guy stopped.

1248. If anyone gets the chance

to PIT him or stop him, do it.

It's authorized.

The shift commander has

given us instructions

that we can stop this guy

any way we need to.

That's not as easy as people would think.

He's able to go around medians

by going in the wrong direction.

I'm just not able to do that.

I need to make sure

that I'm not gonna hit anyone,

I'm not gonna cause any more damage.

Through 7th,

on the sidewalk, passing the car.

Almost signal.

On the opposite lanes

of traffic, Southbound.

High rate of speed coming up to 5th.

Just ran the red light at 5th.

This guy has no regard

for anybody else on the road.

Now he's heading towards probably

one of the most densely populated

pedestrian areas in the city.

And at that point nobody is safe.

On the pedestrian path.

- Just signal.

- Just signal 4'd

in front of Crabby Bill's.

4th Avenue. Out of the car.

Running Southbound.

He's trying to carjack another

Mustang, a black Mustang.

My adrenaline

is starting to go a little bit.

I need to remind myself to calm back down,

so that I can give good information

to the deputies on the ground.

- Sorry, I'm getting amped up.

- No, you're good.

All right, he just carjacked this Mustang.

Taking off in a black convertible Mustang.

Southbound on Gulf Boulevard.

You feel like you're in a video game.

But

obviously, out in the real world,

people die and you can't

come back to life.

You just It's such a hard thing

to do, drive by an accident scene

not knowing if anybody's hurt.

I'm still the lead car

and I'm the only one behind him.

Can anybody end this?

Ram it if you have to.

Go!

Get out of the way, please.

I think the pressure of being

alone during a pursuit is

It's heavy, it weighs very heavy on you.

I'm right behind it.

Looked like that car

was involved in signal 4'd.

The back left tire is gone.

Now, he's not really able to drive

as fast, which is a benefit to us.

But, the driving becomes

a bit more erratic.

He has had so many

near misses. It's terrifying.

The road is getting more narrow.

The number of people are increasing,

which makes a PI

maneuver far more dangerous.

I'm in a tough spot.

I can't get a PIT in.

Headed down by JD's Tavern now.

Eagle, I'll call for you.

2nd Avenue. All right.

Going the wrong way on the

one-way street, on 1st Street.

He doesn't have that tire.

I think he just sideswiped

two more cars on the bike path.

A PIT is just going

to have to happen at some point.

Marine 21. We got two

trucks out here. We'll ram him.

I can see in the distance

lights coming at me.

So a couple more marked cars

and an unmarked car coming at me.

They're much bigger than me.

They have much better front bumpers.

Marine 21 to Car 48.

Permission to ram him?

10-4.

Mustang with stripes, right?

- Yeah, there's a deputy behind him.

- 10-4.

Right, just hit the marine unit.

Now he's fishtailing.

The suspect vehicle is able to get

closer to the wall, go off the road,

narrowly miss one

of the Marine unit pickup trucks.

Only clipping it.

I'm just so frustrated.

He's left a trail of destruction,

multiple car accidents,

and we just aren't catching a break.

Just sideswiped another car. I'm

not sure if that was a cruiser.

He's able to beat two PITs.

And he must just be feeling like

he can get away

with anything at this point.

What is it going to take to stop him?

On the sidewalk, past the car.

High rate of speed.

Over onto the bike lane, past the traffic.

He is now basically on a rim,

which has caused his vehicle

to start fishtailing and losing control.

I'm thinking, "You can't fail."

Adrenaline's running, heart rate's high.

I know that this could be

the only attempt we get.

As I move in for the PIT

and strike the rear of his vehicle.

It pushes him into a white vehicle.

Passing traffic.

What I couldn't see at the time

was that there were two pedestrians

on the sidewalk on

the other side of the white vehicle.

And there's a mom and a stroller

walking across the parking lot.

All right. He just signal 4'd.

It looks clear as day, like,

they're about to get crushed.

And all of my fears

that I've had the entire pursuit

just flash before me.

I thought he was gonna hit the people.

All right, he just signal 4'd.

By some miracle,

the white car never

struck the pedestrians.

It was that sigh of relief.

They were able to get out of the way.

Uninjured.

All right. He just signal 4'd

But the suspect narrowly missing

that mother and the baby stroller,

it really put into sharp contrast

of how reckless this guy was.

He's all over the place!

He's fitting the fence.

He's down 19925 Gulf Boulevard.

He's on the South side of the building.

He's around the back now, driving North.

As the suspect goes

towards the back of the apartment,

I knew that it was a dead end

and he had nowhere to go.

All right. Just hit the fence.

Going through another fence

to the next property to the North.

All right, he's out of the vehicle.

I think he's running Northbound.

Get the ♪♪♪down!

I don't know.

I got the fence.

Alright, he's Northbound in the mangroves

behind the next property to the North.

It's pretty dense foliage

that grows along the shoreline.

I lost sight of him for a second.

Don't ♪♪♪move!

I'm now in the mangroves,

running after somebody

with a whole new set of unique challenges.

The mud is up to my knees.

You don't know what kind

of animals are in there.

And you're trying to make your

way through small rooted trees.

I'm thinking, "Does he have a weapon?

Is he under the influence of drugs?"

His actions have already shown

us that he's willing to do anything.

He's heading kind of East,

Northeast through the mangroves.

Still heading East,

he's coming out to the Intercoastal.

I was relieved to see the suspect

reemerge from the foliage.

19931 Gulf Boulevard.

19931, he's in the mangroves all the

way out by the edge of the water.

I was listening,

so knew I was just North of him

so he was kind of running towards me.

And this guy was completely out of control

and needed to be stopped.

All right. Still heading East.

He's coming out to the Intercoastal.

19931 Gulf Boulevard. 19931.

He's in the mangroves all the way

out by the edge of the water.

He's in the water.

He's swimming Eastbound.

I've got all this gear.

All of it is going to become

useless if I get in the water.

And he's going to have the upper hand.

He's bigger than me.

He's erratic. He's unpredictable.

- Hey, get on the

- Don't move!

Hey, let me see your hand!

My concern was, you know,

does he have a weapon?

We had a few guys that had less

lethal out, which was our tasers.

And then we had a few guys

with their service weapon out also.

We've got deputies

challenging from the dock.

He's eating drugs. Eating drugs.

I observed the suspect

pulling something out of his pocket.

And then he started ingesting

whatever the substance was.

Generally, people do that with drugs

that they're trying to get rid of.

Yeah, he's out of it.

He's whacked out of his mind.

I don't think he had any comprehension

of what he was really doing.

Yeah, Marine units 97.

Guys, use caution. He's got

his right hand down by his side.

Not sure if he is trying

to pull up his pants,

- or to reach for something.

- He had something white there.

I think he still has it in his left hand.

- He just pointed like he had a g*n.

- Yeah.

That's another thought

that you have to really process

as you're coming up

to take somebody into custody.

That last unknown risk

that you've not been able to quell.

I'm getting a ride, that's all.

He almost seemed defeated, like he knew

he was just going

to be taken into custody.

Marine units have got him

on the boat. They're going 10-15.

He was punching at us.

He was kicking at us.

He was grabbing different deputies.

Just nonstop fighting.

Stop resisting! Give us your hand!

Now your says me hold on.

Unfortunately,

in a boat, it's very unstable.

It's like a fish out of water.

Guys, need backup! They need

to get another unit on board.

Yeah, he's fighting with them.

Get handcuffs on his arm.

- Stop pulling, dude!

- This is the PCSD!

Good cover. Great form.

All right. And that is cut.

- That's 64. We're 10-15.

- Alright.

It was a great feeling that this

whole chaos was over with finally.

28 copy. 10-15 on the vessel.

10-5 Eagle, great job!

Thanks. Good job by you guys too.

I cannot believe

all of that just happened.

And you have that sigh of relief.

He was speaking to one of the deputies,

and he did admit to consuming cocaine

and marijuana at some point in time.

Whether that was before the chase,

during the chase,

we weren't 100 percent sure.

Once the Marine unit was able to get

the suspect back to their dock,

search service person found

nothing. No drugs, no g*ns.

Eagle, do we need to check

anything else out from the air?

I might just travel the path again,

just so we can get good

aerial visuals and everything.

This incident is probably

one of the longest

and most involved in my career.

The amount of crimes

that he committed, damage that he caused,

and other people that he affected

was definitely more

than anything else I've seen.

I've seen hundreds of thousands

of dollars worth of damages.

It clearly reminded me of something

that you would see on a video game.

But this was not a video game.

These are real people's lives.

It's a miracle that nobody got hurt.

Once I was finally able

to look at the Mustang,

get a good look, with a clear mind,

and it was completely destroyed.

Damaged in every way. Every

part of that vehicle had a dent.

He's lucky to even be alive.

A man faces more than 30 charges

after a wild police

chase in Pinellas County.

The sheriff's office says

that Kenneth Lunford

led them on a chase in multiple

stolen vehicles on Sunday.

Investigators say it started

when Lunford stole

a man's keys following a drug deal.

Authorities were able to catch him

after he crashed into

an Indian Shores parking lot

and then ran into the water.

No one was seriously hurt.

This is hands down the most

wild and chaotic pursuit

I've ever been a part of.

- He's in the water.

- The goal of any pursuit is

to end it peacefully

and without anyone being injured.

And that's exactly what we did.

Fairburn is a metro Atlanta area.

You got a lot of highways

that goes through Fairburn.

It's busy all throughout the day.

My name is Dennis. I'm a Corporal

at Fairburn Police Department.

What I would typically

do in Fairburn on shift

is I would look for traffic stops,

look for anything that's been

broken into over the night.

One of my favorite things is,

honestly, the adrenaline.

I'm an adrenaline junkie.

You never know what kind of call

you're going to go to, you never

know what you're going to get into.

Around 11:30 a.m. I received a alert

of a stolen vehicle

in the city of Fairburn.

I remember hearing

the call come out over the radio.

All the patrol officers that were

with me in the police department

were running out the door

because we wanted to get in on the action.

It's gonna be a Nissan Rogue

vehicle, silver color SUV.

I was hauling butt to get there.

Just to get to the area, I was doing 100.

As I approached the intersection,

I looked to my left and to my right.

As I looked to my left

I located the vehicle

that matched what the alert said.

I could see that there was two people

in there that I knew of for sure.

I didn't want them to know that

I knew that their car was stolen.

So, what I did was I went to the

next street and I turned around.

Sierra Victor 2154.

It's the stolen vehicle

here on West Campbellton

I made sure that

I kept eyes on the vehicle

and letting my colleagues know where

I was and where the vehicle was.

It was relatively close

to the police department.

We came out of the parking lot.

We had made a left

onto a four lane highway and started

to go through downtown area.

Where is it located?

The vehicle is going

to be the first one in line

to go on this green light.

It is occupied three times.

There's always strength in numbers

and that was the game plan there.

The more officers we could

have there to trap the car in,

a better chance we had

of stopping a pursuit.

Pacheco was approaching

Northbound on highway 29

and then Captain Israel was

on West Campbellton facing East.

And Vanloo,

he actually came on Highway 29.

Turn up.

- You wanna box him in?

- Yeah, go ahead.

Vanloo pulled forward

in front of the vehicle

to which then I pulled forward as well.

I thought for sure we had him.

The car started going

in reverse. I said, "Here we go."

Go PIT them in.

Officer Pacheco immediately

put his vehicle back in drive

trying to make sure the driver

couldn't go forward again.

But the suspect pushed

his car out of the way

and went up onto the sidewalk.

The passenger was

on the rear passenger side.

I saw him get out of the vehicle.

He took off running.

Any pursuit,

there's a certain level of danger.

You just never know

what dangers are there.

I'm clear. I'm catching up.

We're going Southbound.

About miles an hour.

If there is any units

just around the downtown area,

the passenger

bush-bonded. Black male.

Black shirt with some designs on it.

Last seen running towards the stage.

So I jumped the sidewalk

with the patrol vehicle.

I wasn't quick enough

and he got down by me

and the driver continued to

accelerate at a high rate of speed.

My main concern,

of course, was public safety.

Got to get back up to him and make

sure he doesn't k*ll somebody.

The dangers that you

can run into is obviously

hitting another citizen's vehicle.

You have to pay attention,

in trying to assure

that I'm not going to hurt anybody.

Honestly, you just have

to rely on your sirens.

Southbound. 122 miles an hour.

Going South on Highway 29,

our speeds were well above 100.

If you hit another

vehicle going that fast,

the likelihood

of a fatality is, it's there.

It's a very real possibility.

There was so much risk involved.

I'm catching up with him,

going Southbound.

While I was attempting

to catch up to the vehicle,

I just breathed and I told

myself to calm down, relax,

look around me,

be aware of my surroundings.

Sometimes they do try

to drive very recklessly

to try to get us to cancel chasing them.

We have to stop this driver

before they strike somebody head on.

The vehicle already had damage to it.

There are things falling off

of the car, so I had to avoid those.

There was a lot of dust.

We have a landfill

in our small country town,

and the trucks were

coming out at that time of day,

and there was a lot of dust.

And at one point, we were doing good

just to see each other's vehicles.

Pesting a bishop road,

vehicle's driving at medium

oncoming lanes.

The cars had to duck and weave

and go into opposite lanes

of travel themselves

to avoid being struck.

I got radio traffic.

Report, heading North, correction,

heading S outh on Roosevelt.

His speeds are going to be 139 mph.

I think the driver was honestly just

trying to get me to cancel the chase

and be very reckless.

But due to how clear

the roadway was and the traffic,

I was able to continue.

7176. Permission to PIT?

PIT maneuver is causing

a car accident to end a pursuit.

I was very excited to do the PI

because it was going to be my first one.

But I also had to assure

that I didn't hurt anybody else.

Take him out.

Set up the pit, right side.

Due to the suspect being

erratic and very reckless

I was not able to safely

do a successful PIT.

I wasn't upset or anything.

It just has to be right,

because I don't want

to mess up or injure anybody else.

He went on the opposite side of the road

and was traveling head-on into traffic.

The driver clearly does not care

about anyone or anything.

He's just trying

to get away from the police.

Radio, vehicle's gone off road

on the railroad tracks.

The vehicle's going up and down

causing extensive damage.

I thought the vehicle

was going to be disabled,

to which the driver

was going to be running on foot.

It's gonna be two occupied,

one male, one female.

At the moment, the only people in danger

are the people inside that stolen vehicle.

So I took the opportunity to sh**t ahead

and block off traffic so no other

citizens would be in danger.

I'm over on the track.

- We need to drive over on the track.

- Over what?

How many units are there?

We got three on the road.

Left, turned left. They're

going to be 20 miles per hour.

And it's now going left.

Speed's at 85.

When the vehicle got back

on the roadway, I was stunned.

I did not think the vehicle

would be able to continue to drive.

It looked like at any

moment it could fall apart.

The next goal to stop the pursuit

was just wait for an opportunity

to safely conduct a PIT maneuver.

When you're going down a road like that,

it is very hard to set up a PIT maneuver

due to the windiness

of it, the narrowness of it.

Heading South on Gullatt.

Speeds are going to be 74 mph.

Speeds on those country roads

in those 35 miles per hour zones

would have been dangerous,

you wouldn't be able to see

oncoming traffic around those curves

while trying to execute that maneuver.

When you're going through a narrow road,

really at that moment, because

your reaction time is slimmer,

you really just try to keep

eyes on the suspect vehicle.

Any pursuit, we always

want to weigh the risk

compared to what you would call,

quote unquote, the reward.

Is this pursuit going to go

through school zones

or heavily traveled areas?

What's the traffic

situation like? Is it raining?

All that affects driving conditions

and will put not only the driver

or the general public in danger,

but it can put the officer

in danger as well.

Traffic is light.

Passing the road at the moment.

There was certainly

less traffic to worry about.

But now in place of the traffic,

we had to worry about sharp

curves and bends in the roadway,

slowing down our vehicles.

Obviously, they weren't slowing down.

They were still trying to get away.

So they were maintaining

a constant high rate of speed

while, us officers,

using due regard to make sure

we don't hurt ourselves or others

or lose control of our vehicles,

are having to slow down

while at the same time

trying to keep that line of sight on

them down these narrow roads.

When you're traveling at

approximately 70, 80 miles per hour,

you approach things

very quickly on the back roads.

Even with no traffic on those curves,

the slightest mistake in his driving,

he would have went off-road and could

have very well taken his own life.

And I was in the back.

I was in a Ford Explorer,

and they're a little bit slower

compared to the Dodge Chargers.

And my main thought at that time

was just keep them in sight.

Heading south on Gullatt. Speeds

are going to be 74 miles per hour.

Speeds are going to be 46.

Traffic is light.

I was going to attempt a PIT maneuver.

I thought the driver

was going to turn left.

Right, right on Thomas.

Right on Thomas, sir.

However, the driver

decided to take a right,

so I was unable to make contact.

- Copy. A right on Collinsworth.

- Take the pit.

Not successful. Continuing.

The initial contact

on the vehicle, it was not enough.

Unsuccessful.

West on Collinsworth.

Prepare for PIT!

I made contact with

the vehicle, spun the vehicle out.

The vehicle went into the ditch.

PIT successful!

Our goal is to make sure

they don't jump out

and take off running and get away on foot.

Give me your

f*cking hands! Get out!

We know they were doing anything

to run away, so now you don't know

if they're going

to continue to fight with you.

Are they done? Are they

in need of medical assistance?

They're in custody.

I felt relieved. I felt good because

we got a suspect in custody.

Nobody harmed. Nobody hurt.

You can't get any better than that.