High Speed Chase (2023) s02e04 Episode Script

1
It seemed like he was driving
with his hair on fire.
Dennis has gotten away multiple times,
so I don't wanna let him get away again.
I just stole it right this second.
Woo, almost hit a semi.
This is crazy.
This is something you see in a movie.
There's a pursuit!
From my end, it was pure chaos.
Cruisers were going everywhere.
This is now not just a pursuit,
now we're dealing with a madman.
- 911, do you have an emergency?
- Yes, somebody just stole my van.
- Do you know who took it?
- No, I do not.
I'm in here working and
suddenly it just took off
across the parking lot and it's gone.
It's a white, Ford, F250. Cargo van.
On March 23rd, I was on road patrol.
I was on the west side
of the city of Lima.
- Copy?
- Clear.
I can forward you the possible plate.
Where Lima is located is very close
to the intersection of US-30
and Interstate 75.
We're right in the middle
of where a lot of
bigger cities have to pass through.
We need to find the van.
It could go northbound or southbound on 75
and we could never see it again.
I just fucking stole this bitch.
I just stole it right this second.
We're going fucking 90 miles an hour.
Y'all don't know me.
I'm gonna be famous soon.
Whoa, almost hit a semi!
We might die today.
Oh, shit, there's a cop right there.
- Six-seven, 56 75.
- FYI. They're southbound.
At 12:10 p.m., I heard Sergeant Brock
say that he believes that he found
the stolen van.
Okay, I'm gonna stop talking now.
Oh, my God, he's fucking coming fast.
We gotta get out and run. And we're
gonna have some fun. Bye now.
Continuing southbound.
Speed's at 88, 89 mile an hour.
Allen County is in pursuit of a
vehicle southbound 75 at the 119.
Suspect attempts to take the 4th
Street exit to go back towards Lima.
He puts everybody else
that's on the highway at risk
for that van to strike another vehicle.
The suspect is now throwing items
out of the van
in an attempt to get Sergeant Brock
to back up.
At this point, Sergeant Brock is the
only one involved in the pursuit.
I'm attempting to catch up
from, you know, another exit back.
We have no idea how many people
may be inside,
we don't know if they're armed.
Once you get off I-75, it becomes
more of a rural area, a lot of farming.
Ran a stop sign on National.
Still southbound.
Once we start getting close
to county lines,
we let our dispatch know to
contact the county
that we're about to go into.
Allen County is in pursuit
of a vehicle southbound.
Ford van, white in color.
Southbound, blew the stop sign
at Buckland Holden. Still southbound.
At this point,
we're going 70, 80 miles an hour.
He's not worried
about anybody else's safety,
his only concern is trying
to get away from us.
402, we're gonna be approaching
67 here, real quick.
I'm going to stay stationary
at Townline 33 for now.
I was in my marked patrol unit,
and once I got to Middle Pike Road,
I sat stationary
because they were going south.
They're coming right here.
Blew a stop sign at Townline
and Middle Pike.
I thought, this guy is crazy
and he probably has nothing to lose.
I was on US 33, which is one of
the busier highways in the county.
And I just stop there just to prevent
cars from trying to pass.
- 30-33.
- There's a pursuit!
Still southbound on Townline.
It was very surreal
that this was happening.
Once you start seeing other cruisers
from Auglaize County, at Wapak,
there's more lights, there's more sirens,
but it becomes that much more dangerous
for everybody else involved.
Westbound on Wapak-Fisher.
West of Wapak-Fisher.
At that point, we were concerned,
because the intersection
of Wapak-Fisher Road and US 33
is a very dangerous intersection,
coming into the city of Wapakoneta.
Speed's about 73.
We're gonna have the spikes
at Wapak-Fisher and 33.
My job was to block off the intersection.
If we could stop him from
entering the city,
that's what we wanted to do.
In Auglaize County, we are limited
a lot on how to stop a suspect.
Pit maneuver's not authorized.
911, I'm going to go just try
to get stop sticks out there.
If we can deploy stop sticks
that flattens the tires,
that slows the pursuit.
92, do you wanna get set up
with spikes up here?
My task, at this point,
was to stop some traffic
to free up the intersection.
They're coming.
He's not stopping,
he's coming to the intersection.
I see a deputy try to deploy
the stop sticks.
Deputy Feldner had a pretty
substantial risk
because he didn't have a good area
to escape from.
We attempt to get this van pinned in
to where they can't go anywhere
and we can end the pursuit.
As we're all trying to approach,
the van takes off.
Stop!
Deputy Feldner took his gun out
because he thought he was gonna get
ran over by the car,
and that's how a lot of officers
get hit, injured, or killed.
It was probably a couple feet away
from actually hitting him.
These events happen really quickly.
From my angle, it was pure chaos.
Cruisers were going everywhere.
The van starts traveling
in the opposite direction it was
coming from.
All right, I'm first in it now.
I thought, this guy is so desperate.
He's crazy.
Because I've never seen anything like this
in my entire career, not even remotely.
Westbound on 33.
I'm just hoping that he doesn't turn
into the city.
This is a worst-case scenario,
that something may happen that could
be catastrophic for multiple people.
Blew through one set of spikes.
We're going.
Heading down Bellefontaine Street.
Went out of the ditch, regained control.
So it's really easy to get
tunnel vision during these pursuits.
And some things that you can do
to minimize the mistakes
is just keep making sure
that you're breathing.
Coming into town, approaching truck stop.
And relaying information as you
get it to your dispatcher.
The worst-case scenario
was coming into play.
Direction is still westbound.
Coming into town.
It's around lunchtime, and a lot of people
come down to this specific area
to do shopping and get their lunch.
I believed it was time to call
the pursuit off.
- 911.
- Hello?
If you don't get
these fucking cops off me,
I'm gonna shoot this bitch in the
face. You've got five seconds
to get off my ass. Right now. I'm
not joking the fuck around.
Get them off me now, or I'm
gonna shoot this bitch
in the face. I'm not playing! I
will shoot her in the face!
Scream, bitch!
Where's she from? What is she doing?
This is now not just a pursuit.
Now, we have a hostage situation.
Hey, hey, hey, what's your name?
I've lost him. This is not going
to end well. Code 40.
All units be advised, he's threatening
he's going to use a code 40 on you guys.
Code 40 is
our code for a gun.
This changes the pursuit dramatically.
He's coming up on some congested
traffic now.
It's absolutely become
a life-or-death situation
at this point in time.
We had to get the suspect stopped.
Now, we were in it till the end.
He's going back to the park on Wagner.
At this point, we're unsure
of the safety of the hostage,
but you believe that the hostage
is safe while they are moving.
The biggest threat is gonna come
when that vehicle is stopped.
Be great if we can get somebody
up here on spikes.
When the suspect hung-up,
we tried to call back several times,
and we could not get him back
on the phone.
He's still westbound. He's gonna
ride it all the way through town.
We had several different
agencies involved.
We had marked cruisers, unmarked cruisers,
deputies that had SWAT training.
It takes a lot of coordination
to stop something like this.
Coming up on Fairview.
He's turned into the fairground.
Turned into the fairground.
I'm happy that they're going
to the fairgrounds
because I know there's not gonna be
a whole lot of population there.
If someone thinks they can close
the gate at the fairground?
We knew there was fence
around the entire fairgrounds,
we knew there was only two entrances
in the front.
One entrance that had a padlock
and a gate on it,
and another entrance that was open.
Unit one to all units, I'm gonna try
and shut the front gate.
He's heading back behind the show arenas.
He's getting ready to come out now.
Going northbound, coming up by the cabin.
This was our time that
we could get him cornered.
The gate literally explodes.
Coming back out on West Auglaize Street.
This guy is so desperate at
this point, he has nothing to lose.
My concern, as a commander,
was the hostage.
What was she going through?
He's in a field.
I'm going in the field.
He was just increasingly desperate.
He started to tip over,
I couldn't believe it.
How many times this guy gonna get lucky?
He's running the wrong way
on the four-lane.
I was extremely nervous
about getting into a crash.
Then he does a 180.
At that point, a couple of State
Troopers got involved.
All right, eastbound, 33.
Just got on at 33A.
Allen County units 6.4's involved.
We're at 80 miles an hour.
Still eastbound, 33.
Speed's about 90.
I notice that there was a unit
stopped underneath the bridge
of Interstate 75,
trying to deploy stop sticks.
He just went the other way. He's
going eastbound in the west lane.
He noticed it at the same time.
Back over. I'll be the lead car.
Eastbound, 70 miles an hour.
He was acting erratic.
In my experience,
in my years in law enforcement,
this shows that that usually
has something to do with drugs.
You might want to consider putting
the school on a working lockdown.
We got a pursuit that's been going on
for about the last 45 minutes.
But this guy is crazy and he's got a gun.
All the city schools are all put
on lockdown.
We don't know where this pursuit
is gonna go.
We don't know if he's gonna pull up
and try and take another hostage.
As a commander, you're looking
at a situation like this,
what's he gonna run through next?
There's a train here.
I saw the train
and I was, honestly, in disbelief.
Parallel with the train.
South on Geyer.
This is something you see in a movie.
The road we were on
crossed the railroad tracks.
So it was imperative that I stayed
as close to him as I could.
South on Geyer.
Coming over the tracks.
We got the train right behind us.
There was no way
that I was gonna lift off the gas,
and you kind of do that quick math
in your head, are we gonna beat this?
As soon as we cross the tracks,
I kept checking my rear-view mirror.
We're still southbound. Speed's 65.
We got some guys through and continued on.
Northbound, 65, St. John.
Spinning out.
The vehicle is on borrowed time.
So at this point, we're looking for,
where can this pursuit possibly end?
It looks like that semi-truck
is blocking them.
The semi-trucks are creating a roadblock.
They're creating a roadblock, FYI.
A lot of times, in pursuits,
we are fortunate enough
to have situations like this,
where trucks, you know,
will try to help us out.
Coming up to the one-five.
Still northbound. He's in the ditch.
He's now driving through a field.
Going to go northeast.
Around 1-5-8-9-0, 1-5-8-9-0, 65.
With the hostage situation,
we were not stopping.
That's the one person I wouldn't
wanna see get hurt in this situation.
Eastbound on Blank Pike.
Eastbound on Blank.
Tire's flat. Front right is flat.
Coming up to Wrestle Creek.
He is going south on Wrestle Creek.
We knew he was starting to lose control.
We finally had the upper-hand.
There was enough law enforcement officers
around that he wasn't gonna get away.
Two, I'm set up at 33 Wapak-Fisher.
I'll have spikes here
if he comes this way.
Up ahead, a couple other units were going
to attempt to throw stop sticks.
Let these guys through. Come on!
Hold on, hold on.
I'm gonna get this across. Let me--
Joe, stop them.
Stop them. I'm gonna get this across.
So that way, we're set.
Still westbound.
Coming up to Wapak spike strip.
- Come on, baby.
- Here they come. I can hear them.
Clear.
Yeah, I'm just going to set and run.
And then we'll run back quick
and try to get him.
Hopefully they back up enough.
Come on! Come on! Get through!
- Here we go, here we go, here we go!
- Jimmy!
Back off! Back off!
Two, they hit the spikes.
It looks like at least one
of the right side.
Tires of the vehicle disabled.
Still westbound. Coming up to 75.
Now, with two flat tires, this was
our chance to get the pursuit ended.
Going under 75. Still westbound.
Speed's at 85.
He's going the opposite way on 33.
He's going westbound
in the eastbound lane, just off 75.
Try to get that traffic up there stopped.
He is on the other side,
by the tomato factory.
I jumped the fence. I'm with him.
Going past the tomato factory.
Okay, he got back on the dirt road here.
I don't see anybody out walking out
here. He's all over the road.
He's all over the roadway, spinning out.
Let's get him blocked in, right here.
Everybody try to get him blocked in.
His back two tires are flat.
You're right. He's all over.
He's gonna crash soon, I feel.
His tires are shredding at this point.
The rim's just grinding, sparks flying.
Units up ahead. Watch for a tire.
He's going through a field.
Going behind General Aluminum here,
I believe.
The most tense moment, really,
of any pursuit, is the end.
You don't know what's gonna happen.
In this case,
we knew there was a gun involved.
Our number one priority,
keep the hostage safe.
Get on the ground! Get on the ground!
Get on the ground! Get on the ground!
I was shouting at her to get on the
ground to try to control the scene.
The safest place for her to be.
- I'm with you.
- He was gonna kill me!
Stay down.
I noticed the driver exited
out of the driver's side of the van.
One of our detectives drove up
next to him.
There was a zero chance
that he was gonna get away.
They got him.
- Does he have a gun?
- He has a knife.
Is there anybody else in there?
No, he had a knife to me the whole time.
Are you injured in any way?
You're not injured?
Just my knee hit something
in the van. But I'm okay.
You just need to sit and we'll talk
to you here in a minute.
I was relieved that the female was
safe, and everybody else was safe.
I was physically and mentally exhausted.
What kind of drugs are you on?
What kind of dope? Marijuana?
- I ate some meth.
- You ate a bunch of meth?
Yeah. I don't feel good.
- How much is a bunch?
- About 3 grams.
- Three grams?
- Yep.
After the pursuit, we collected
his cell phone as evidence.
Detectives were able to extract a video.
Boom, my goodness, I'm a beast. I'm a
master and I'm a fucking mastermind.
I'm a very good, smart person.
I'm very genius-ly, okay.
Okay. I'm going to stop talking now.
I just want you guys to know,
I will be in touch with you.
He talks about posting it to social media,
and I think that was just his attempt
at looking for his five minutes of fame.
The reality is, he's gonna be sitting
in jail for a long time.
Was he trying to steal the van,
get to a point where he could
get his next drugs?
We don't know. I don't know if we'll
ever know why he stole that van.
Please, God. Help me out.
Please, God.
The female was identified as 25-year-old
Angela Marshall, from Angola, Indiana.
There's a few seconds of video where
the female can be seen in the van,
and she's wearing sunglasses. She
doesn't appear to be under duress.
It's slowly starting to come out
that they were in a relationship
and that at no point was she actually
in danger.
Baby, I love you. They're not
gonna charge you with anything.
You didn't do anything wrong.
It's frustrating for us to know
that we put our lives on the line
to continue this to save her
when she really wasn't a hostage.
I was very proud of all the men and
women in law enforcement that day.
They could've given up at any point,
said, I'm out. They didn't.
They stayed in for an hour and 20 minutes
until that suspect was in custody.
That's what we wanted,
that's what we did that day.
Frankfort, I've got a Harley
taking off on me.
I'm attempting to stop.
Passing Odell Street, high rate of speed.
Black Harley Davidson motorcycle.
White male operator.
Dark, long sleeve upper clothes
and blue jeans.
Hundred miles an hour southbound,
approaching Woody Road.
With motorcycles,
we don't pursue just for basic stuff.
Motorcycles are typically faster,
more agile,
but they can also cause
a greater threat to the rider
if they attempt to evade police.
10-4, I believe
that will be Dennis Hanson.
Dennis Hanson will be the driver.
I've personally been involved in two
or three pursuits with Dennis.
I've known Dennis to carry firearms
and be involved in illicit drug activity.
I don't know if he just doesn't like
us, is worried about prison time,
or just thinks he can get away and
brag later that he ran and got away.
With it being Dennis, and with him
getting away multiple times in the past,
that is why we pursued on him.
Can tonight be the night that I can
potentially take him off the streets
and maybe save someone's life?
The I-57 interstate is used heavily
by semi-trucks
traveling with large loads of freight.
With it being a Friday night,
there was a heavy mixture
of different types of vehicles.
The posted speed limit on I-57
is 70 miles per hour.
Dennis reached speeds in excess of 120.
We wanna get Dennis stopped at this point
before he causes harm to himself
or any of the public.
When it comes to motorcycle pursuits,
we are not allowed to use stop sticks
or pit maneuvers.
At those speeds, on a motorcycle
with no helmet, no protective gear.
If Dennis would've wrecked
or made one wrong move,
the chance of survival
would've been very, very slim.
He's only got two wheels,
so he's able to get by in areas that
a vehicle can't.
I believe it to be the ultimate game
of cat and mouse.
It's an active construction zone.
Are they just resurfacing?
Are we gonna be at these speeds
and see the motorcycle disappear
in a whole
because a large section of the road
is missing?
Dennis has gotten away multiple times,
so I don't wanna let him get away again.
I'm left with no choice
to get around the semi.
I gotta go through the construction zone.
I'm putting myself in danger
just for the unknown of what's ahead.
I see, in the distance, that single
taillight that I'm looking for.
But I still need to catch up to him
to make sure
that I haven't let him get away.
After several miles,
we run into more road construction.
I find myself behind a tanker semi truck,
which isn't a situation
you wanna find yourself in.
If something were to happen
at that thing and it blew up,
it would be catastrophic.
Being on a narrow motorcycle, he's
able to make the escape to get by,
causing me to lose visual of him
once again.
With how far we've traveled up this road,
I am extremely determined
to catch back up to him.
I wanna get him caught,
he's not getting away from me.
Nothing at this point
has slowed Dennis down.
Even with the traffic,
it's barely slowed him down.
He squeezes in an area
that is hardly wider than himself
between the semi
and the shoulder of the road.
One wrong move by Dennis
with the semi driver
could cause Dennis to be crushed
or killed in the situation.
As I'm traveling, I observed
a vehicle on the left lane,
and as I approach, they continued
to stay in the lane the entire time.
This vehicle failing to get over sooner
makes me have to make
a split-second decision
to attempt to get around it,
putting myself at risk
while I'm attempting
to catch back up to Dennis.
Just here, at mile marker 92.
Are you in pursuit?
10-4, we're on with him,
we're heading northbound at, uh, 94.
Speed's 120.
With how reckless he was driving,
he had very high potential
to crash or hurt other people,
they would see our lights
and they're not even seeing the
motorcycle that's passing by them.
They might look in the mirror
and be clear for a second,
and the next second,
the motorcycle's right there,
and that could cause an accident
very quickly.
I can see a concrete barrier
that divides the two lanes,
making the lanes very skinny.
Being on a motorcycle, he's able
to make the squeeze and get by.
At that point,
I kind of lost a little bit of hope
that I was gonna be able
to catch back up to him.
It's happened again, he got away again.
Every second that I'm behind the semi,
it's another second
Dennis is able to get away.
I'm stuck behind the
semi for about a minute.
That meant it feels like an eternity.
At this time, I'm thinking,
it's time to call the pursuit off,
due to me not locating him yet.
We've put in this much work, we've
traveled this far, the distance,
and he's won again.
At that point, I just assume that the
individual probably got away.
And then I saw the flash
of the motorcycle,
and I was kind of thinking to myself,
I'm like, no way.
There he is, he's right there.
As I get even closer, that sense of hope,
that sense of "he hasn't won" is there.
Dennis decides that, at mile marker 116,
that he was gonna exit the interstate.
He goes south, to a small village
called Sandoval.
I am unfamiliar with Sandoval,
so I'm completely in the dark
on what we're gonna be faced with.
There's also things
going through your mind,
like, does he live in this village?
Does he know somebody in this village?
It is a wait and see situation
of does he lose control?
Does an animal run out in front of
him? Does he run out of fuel?
We're pushing that 90-mile marker
so he's obviously not been
just babying this motorcycle,
how it should be babied,
to achieve that optimum fuel economy.
He's been wide open on it the whole time
so you got that thought
in the back of your head
of you gotta be run out of gas
sooner or later.
I'm gonna outlast you on gas.
Hey, dude, just pull over.
Pull over, down on your knees,
hands behind your back.
Just stop at this point.
You're caught.
It seemed like he was driving
with his hair on fire,
trying to evade us and trying
to get away with total disregard
for the public or his own safety.
You don't know if somebody's gonna be
walking their dog, maybe jogging.
They're not gonna
be expecting a motorcycle
to be coming down the sidewalk.
We got onto a side street, and the
side street had loose gravel in it.
I kind of determined that the pursuit
was coming to an end,
that's when I sort of play in my
head, kind of weighing my options.
Even though I had my K-9 with me,
my mind wasn't even going to that.
I didn't wanna be sitting there,
holding a dog,
and getting shot by this guy.
Dennis is probably getting up
to speeds of around 40,
maybe 50 miles an hour.
That's not speeds that you
wanna travel, with the loose gravel.
As I watch the bike go down on its
side, there's a lot of uncertainty.
You're sitting there, thinking
to yourself, what is gonna happen?
This is Dennis' first real mistake
of this entire pursuit.
Get on the fucking ground!
Down on the ground, right now!
Get on the fucking ground now!
Once the guy starts to stand up,
I withdrew my duty weapon
and held it at the low, ready.
Down on the ground!
I'm a tazer instructor, so I understand
their capabilities and what they can do.
We were able to get him into custody.
- Please don't hurt me. Please.
- You're all right.
He appears to be uninjured
from this whole thing.
This is a miracle,
with him driving so recklessly.
Something that he is not accustomed
to is getting caught,
he's used to being able to get away.
And now that we've got him in front of us,
that last click of that handcuff
was just a sense of excitement
that we're able to get him
off the street, finally.
I located a white bag on Dennis' person,
containing a white,
crystal-like substance.
The later field tested positive
for methamphetamine.
A man leads Williamson County
deputies on a 100-mile long chase,
driving a motorcycle at speeds more
than 100 miles per hour.
Officials say Dennis Hanson
has a long history of running
from the police.
The chase began late Friday night
in West Frankfort,
but when officers lost sight of Hanson,
Williamson County deputies took over.
It's an extreme sense of satisfaction
knowing that I've caught somebody
who's gotten away so many times.
The fact that he's got the advantage
of being on a motorcycle
and that we were still able
to keep up with him,
you just feel exhausted.
You just whooped that.
You just put all your energy
into chasing Dennis.
And now it's time to come back to the
real world and get back to business.