High Speed Chase (2023) s02e06 Episode Script

1
It was a white male driver.
Speeds are 94.
Everybody's in danger.
- He might be ready to bail.
- How is this pursuit going to end?
All right, I got it.
He was gonna do whatever it takes
to get away,
and we needed to put a stop to it.
Is he trying to lure us into a
situation? What is his intention?
This was a person
that was capable of doing anything.
Get out!
That morning, it was the third month
of my field training.
I was a driver.
My field training officer
was sitting in the passenger seat.
I am originally from Tanzania.
It's in Eastern Africa.
When I was growing up,
I would look at officers as heroes.
I wanted to be that guy who would
save somebody's life one day.
We receive a call for a SIGNAL 10,
and a SIGNAL 10 is a stolen vehicle.
The description was a silver Mazda.
We see what appeared to be
a similar vehicle description.
That driver drove past and kind of waved.
At that point, he took off.
It was a game on.
Eastbound on 40.
We're gonna keep going till about 40,
passing at the front of the Burger King.
He was not going to stop.
He was not going to give up.
He was not going to make this easy for us.
We're going to be turning down
Northeast 24th Street.
Still eastbound heading towards baseline.
Speed is going to be 60.
We're leading the pursuit.
And I've never worked
a stolen vehicle before.
And then the other unit
drove past our vehicle.
Delta Three, I'll be in the area
3100 blocks south of mine.
I kind of guessed
where I thought they would be going
so that I could try to get ahead of
the pursuit to use the stop sticks,
because we do not use the pit maneuver.
The sheriff's office does.
I do enjoy a good pursuit.
I do enjoy apprehending criminals.
It's very rare that you get
a stolen vehicle during the day,
so I knew that it was going to turn
into a big event.
We're not in the city environment anymore,
so I'm asking permission
to be able to join the pursuit
and conduct a pit maneuver to end it.
SO, Kilo, if you can join in
and pit them, that'd be great.
We're still southbound on baseline,
just past 7th Street,
coming up to 4th Street, speed's at 89.
They're miles ahead of me,
so I'm just trying to catch up
and trying to think,
why is he standing in this vehicle
during broad daylight?
What is he trying to get away from?
Still southbound on baseline.
Kind of going all over the road.
Speed's are about 90.
Coming up on moderate traffic.
Kilo, did you just signal
for that vehicle?
They actually end up striking
a law enforcement vehicle
with the Florida Department of Wildlife.
Still southbound on baseline,
coming up to Merricamp.
Right now we're doing 60,
he's probably doing about 70.
Get in the left lane.
Still doing southbound on baseline.
We're at Merricamp right now.
We have a red light, we're gonna
see what he's going to do.
Looks like he's anti-Merricamp.
We're going to be going westbound
on Merricamp from baseline.
Still leftbound, passing
in front of Skate Mania,
speed's are 70 right now.
He crashed, man.
That guy was dangerous.
He was willing to do anything
he could do to get away from us.
We'll be coming up to South
and 31st Street.
I was holding into that wheel so
hard, I was like a tunnel vision.
I couldn't even see
my field training officer
because I was pretty much like
asphyxiated to that vehicle.
We'll now be heading eastbound
on Merricamp
just before Southeast 31st Street.
Still eastbound on Merricamp, coming
up to Southeast 44th Avenue Road.
That road is busy.
My big fear was crashing
with another vehicle.
We're going to be going southbound
on Southeast 44th Avenue Road
to EDH Avenue.
Right now, we're doing 50
on Southeast 44th Avenue Road
just crossed over Southeast 38th Street.
Are you with Styx or are you going
to try to intercept for the pit?
I'm going to pit it.
I'm going to try to end it.
I'm closing the distance.
I know where they're at.
I'm familiar with this area.
So I have to be ready for what's next.
We're going to be eastbound
on Southeast 73rd Street from 441.
Right now, speeds are 45,
no vehicle traffic.
We're in road traffic.
Call me when you get 41st
We're going to be down on Southeast
38th Court Road on a dirt road.
Southbound.
I know this road goes
into somebody's house.
Maybe this will be the good place
to catch him
because he's going to be boxed in.
We're going to be parallel
to the road tracks.
Looks like he might be getting ready
to bail.
We can see him keep going through
into the woods
and we're like, no way.
Still going in the wood line.
Now, we're going eastbound
away from the
Road tracks and the wood line.
Again, looks like he might
be getting ready to bail.
Stuck.
All right, let him get his dog.
Police canine. You better stop.
This is my first time drawing a weapon.
Everybody's in danger.
Where is the vehicle?
We're going to be out of our vehicle
running on foot. Canines leading it.
We have no idea what this guy have.
Does he have a weapon?
Still southeast.
Looks like there's a property here.
We still haven't found the vehicle.
I don't know if he can continue driving.
There was like an abandoned house.
We thought, he might have abandoned
the vehicle and run into that house.
But there's no vehicle.
Are you east or west of railroad tracks?
Southeast of the railroad tracks.
I'm trying to figure out what's the
next step. What are we going to do?
I don't know if he got
all the way out or not.
I don't even see any tire tracks.
Coyote Police Department.
How did this guy get away?
How did he make it through this woods?
Now, we don't have anything.
We don't have a vehicle,
we don't have a suspect.
He was definitely lucky entering
that wood line and not getting stuck
and evading the officers of Ocala.
But I know that sooner or later,
his luck is going to run out.
I got it. Eastbound 30th court.
Everybody 10-9. SOQ has it.
Get off the radio.
I absolutely did not expect that
vehicle to make it out of the woods.
I was slightly impressed.
He's down 30 and four foot, 56.
There's going to be an area.
I was preparing to get out
to potentially put stop sticks.
I heard Sergeant Young and I can see
his unmarked patrol vehicle.
The vehicle was coming at such
a high rate of speed,
I stayed in my vehicle.
5196 Lane.
I got behind Deputy Esquivel.
I took over communications.
Having somebody else show up when I
needed him the most, it felt great.
Now, I have a backup deputy.
Now, I can pit this vehicle.
He's down 30.
He was increasing speed,
I believe to make a larger dust cloud
to try to cause us to lose sight.
I did need to back off.
Because my concern
was striking Deputy Esquivel.
I'll take into account
everything that he's doing
and I know it's either now or never.
I knew that it was probably
not his first time
he was in a vehicle pursuit.
He knew what my next move was coming.
Multiple times he blocked me
from conducting a pit maneuver.
He's over there in the yard, 3000 blocks.
All right, he's at signal four.
He was getting desperate
and he was going to do whatever it
takes to get away.
And we needed to put a stop to it.
He is turning south.
He is gunning it.
I've never seen anything like that before.
Heads-up, if you've got the ability
to switch channel, switch channel.
He's familiar with that neighborhood.
And I was anticipating him running.
I'm not going to pursue him
into this backyard.
It's a very narrow backyard.
I can't see the other side of it.
So I'm going to stop and wait to see
what he does next.
As I looked over to my left,
it was like something out of a movie
as I watched the suspect now coming
right at my driver's door.
The first thought was, "Please
don't hit me, please don't hit me."
As soon as he passed,
there was a moment of relief.
- And then the pursuit was on.
- We could stop him there.
We're gonna circle.
Eastbound.
It was boggling my mind that
we were still continuing.
I would have assumed that
through all that damage,
it would have immobilized it.
However, it was the little engine
that could that just kept going.
Being with K-9 Jet, that's a blessing.
I can hear him start getting vocal.
He starts getting excited.
He's spinning in the backseat,
ready to come out of the car.
He made the right turn.
He almost struck two vehicles.
I saw the opportunity to pit him.
I spun him out.
I gave him one final touch to make sure
that his vehicle wasn't going anywhere.
And while it may not have been the
prettiest by the book pit maneuver,
it was successful.
Jet hop in the back!
K9, come on!
Send those K9, go!
Jet was definitely amped up.
Now the bad guy is in his world.
He's really fast,
and that's why he's named Jet.
Down, down, down! Get on the ground!
On the ground! On the ground!
Put your hands behind your back!
Let go of the dog! Let go of the dog!
Once I was able to finally put
the handcuffs on the suspect,
I knew that it was over.
That he couldn't hurt nobody.
We won. We got him.
And I was also happy that
my partner was able to work.
He was able to come out of the car
and do his job.
He's a working dog.
He's meant to do this.
Good job, man.
So when he gets to come out of the
car and gets to apprehend somebody,
I know for him there's no greater
satisfaction.
Good job. Good job. Good job.
He definitely went home
and got a steak that night.
I think Office Uronu did a
fantastic job for his first pursuit.
That's the type of pursuit that some
officers will never see in a career.
And for that early on in his career,
I think he did a phenomenal job
and he's a great officer.
I will never forget that pursuit.
I am very proud.
I'm so happy to work with the
members of Ocala Police Department.
I'll go over and beyond
forever until I retire.
It was a sigh of relief.
It was a job well done by everybody.
If you commit a crime in our county,
you're gonna go to jail.
Hey, sir, get on the ground.
Get on the ground. Get on the ground.
We're gonna chase you down
and we're gonna arrest you.
That morning, we're approaching
the end of my shift duty.
But at the end of each shift,
each officer is required
to gas up their squad car.
Just as I was finishing up
with the fuel depot,
dispatch advised of a suspicious
vehicle in a nearby neighborhood.
A black in color pickup truck
driving down into a ditch
and back through side streets.
I got him.
Just stop.
Just stop. Just stop.
Just stop.
Stop the car.
He was extremely agitated.
He was sweating profusely.
They're pointing at a neighbor
in a house saying that,
"They're behind there. They're trying
to get me. They're trying to get me."
Stop the car! Stop your car!
His speech pattern clearly indicated that
he was most likely very high of
some kind of a toxicant.
Put the car in park now!
Put the car in park!
Put it in park!
When someone's in that kind of state,
you don't know how they're going to react
when they actually have contact
with law enforcement.
And then he took off.
The situation was rapidly
unfolding in front of me
and I needed more units to get,
get to me to see if we can end this
as quick as possible.
When I heard the call dispatch,
I decided to stop what I was doing
and head out to where he was at.
I was listening to the radio.
It appeared as I was on my way that
the situation was escalating.
It's concerning and it heightens
awareness.
The main concern we had was
the amount of people that are out
and about in that neighborhood.
I was seriously concerned that
he was gonna kill somebody.
All of a sudden, he would slow down.
Put your car in park!
And then he would take off again.
Everything he did was completely
unpredictable
and nothing that you've seen before.
I arrived second to Sergeant Burke.
It was at that time that I knew
that this situation
was not going to end quickly.
When I caught up with the pursuit,
the driver was not being cooperative.
During the fact that he was armed
and dangerous,
ratchets up everything to a
extremely high level of alertness.
And the fact that he was the same driver
that led the next town over on a pursuit,
he definitely does not wanna
get caught by the police.
And now we're concerned does he have
weapons in the car?
The risk factor of this pursuit
was extremely high.
We were under the impression that
he was armed and dangerous.
Is he trying to lure us into a situation?
We weren't really sure
what was going through his head,
what is his intention.
At that time, I could see squad cars
coming from all over.
The need to stop this person became great.
Dispatch was calling Lake County,
the only unit I believe that had stop
sticks in their car
was 40 minutes away.
And we are not trained
to do PIT maneuvers.
Our best bet was trying to box him in
to a specific area
and hope he gets stuck in a ditch.
The gap between James Webb's truck
and the squad cars was increasing.
It definitely makes you concerned
about the lengths
this person is willing to go to.
I'm like,
"Keep driving, keep driving."
But all it did was enheighten his speed.
He's turning around.
The suspect vehicle was driving right
at the front end of my squad car.
It could've been deadly in the moment.
The situation was clearly escalating.
His vehicle was considered
a deadly weapon,
especially the way he was driving.
What's he gonna do next?
The vehicle is off the roadway
towards preserved property.
His state was so erratic that we
felt that if we didn't do something,
he actually would hurt
or possibly kill somebody.
Southbound. Approaching Suffolk.
8192, 1028. Information.
The vehicle got off the
road at Spanner road.
What's the next move of James Webb
going to be
when he's completely unpredictable?
- Vehicle got off the road
- We need to put an end to it.
He was reported as armed and dangerous.
We don't want anyone to be injured,
especially civilians.
We closed up at Spanner road.
Trust me, he's gonna find that complex.
This was a game to him.
My hope was with the amount of time
he was going off the road
that he would've either rolled his
truck or got it stuck somewhere.
A192, Westbound Bonner.
He decides to go back west
towards Wauconda.
His speed was picking up.
Now, we're concerned that
he's approaching other communities
and putting them in danger.
I'll be honest,
I'm not a huge fan of pursuits,
because I've seen the effects of
how these things turn out.
Pull over! Pull over!
He just ignored all commands
and kept his erratic driving through
the neighborhood.
8192, moving southbound
and approaching route 176
I was glad because we were going
to be out of a residential area.
Now we have a better chance of boxing
him in and maybe ending this pursuit.
The information provided was Mr. Webb
had been in prison
for second degree murder.
When you hear that come over the radio,
you start to run through scenarios
in your head.
Dispatch was giving more information
in real time,
and that he was also considered armed
and dangerous
from a prior incident in the
neighboring town of Fox Lake.
So the information provided to me
from the neighboring chief was that
he was visiting where
his ex-girlfriend had lived,
and he found a person that she was dating
and beat him with a baseball bat.
That really made us start to become
more concerned
about where the situation was headed.
When he comes face to face
with a Lincoln that was literally
stopped in the roadway,
the driver of the black Lincoln panicked
and started to drive backwards.
This guy ran somebody.
That was pivotal point of
the entire pursuit.
James Webb had a homicide conviction,
this person is capable of doing
anything at this point.
We had 100 percent right to use
deadly force in that circumstance.
But I don't believe any police officer
wants to be put in that situation.
He was shouting vulgarities.
What is he saying?
It appeared that he was not all there.
It's safe to say that the risk
was increasing.
Pull over, pull over!
We wanna try to avoid a confrontation
as much as possible.
Your best bet at that point in time
was to try to talk him out of the vehicle.
Pull over! Pull over!
Stop! Stop!
I'm asking you to pull over.
James was reacting to me,
but not in the way that I wanted to.
We're gonna dialogue with him.
Turn off your siren.
Get out! We can help you!
We can help you!
We can help you! We can help you!
Hey, hey, hey.
Right here! Right here!
Stop! Let's talk.
8192, we're back northbound, Fueller.
Standby for a cross street
from Fremont Center Road.
At this point, in my mind, I'm thinking,
if he does this,
am I going to be ready to do this?
It's just this constant mental
conversation as you're trying to
watch what he's doing,
maintain safety of the community.
But also trying to play
this almost chess game of like,
what is this person?
What's his next move going to be?
What's my next move going to be?
We had officers going backwards,
forwards, down towards ditches,
backing up, doubling back,
three-point turns.
He was driving almost in circles
around squad cars.
And you couldn't tell, just when you
think that he was going to go
one direction, he would flip and go
another direction.
8192, moving back southbound.
You get really nervous when you see him
approach and slow down with other drivers.
He's trying to interact with them,
but you're not quite sure what his
interactions or his intentions are.
Does he have a weapon in his car
he's going to use on that motorist?
Is he looking to try to hurt them?
Does he want to get out of his vehicle
and try to do a carjack on somebody else?
His behavior was everything unpredictable.
So how do you really react to
something that is so unpredictable?
Wauconda 8192, eastbound 176 from Gilmer.
When Mr. Webb started heading back
into Wauconda,
we need to do something right away.
8192.
Will be entering Del Webb boulevard
at 176.
The Del Webb subdivision
is a retirement community.
That just made everything ten times worse.
- Which way is it from Del Webb?
- Right turn.
I felt that we needed stop sticks
because
his driving had elevated
to the next level.
I'm not a huge supporter on having
officers throw the stop sticks.
There are way too many
law enforcement
officers that get killed or injured
when they're deploying stop sticks.
Get back inside! Get back inside!
But I was feeling we had to do something
because it was out of control.
The inherent danger comes with
the officers leaving the
safety of his squad car.
He's out of his vehicle.
He has got the potential now to
either be hit by that fleeing vehicle
if he's not in a safe location.
Deep breaths, deep breaths.
His behavior of not wanting to be
stopped was increasing dramatically.
There are some significantly older people
that live in this neighborhood.
If they're outside, if they're walking,
it was just a whole host of new problems.
8192, a funding vehicle back
on the roadway,
Canton Circle at Ogden.
Go back to the circle.
I'm doing backyard.
Now he's in the very southwest
quarter of subdivision.
We considered him running on foot,
which is why we wanted to make sure that
there was a canine involved
in the pursuit.
Honda 8192, vehicle traveling in reverse.
Off the roadway at 3819.
His vehicle finally stopped.
There was some mud and he just wasn't
able to go any further.
We didn't know if James Webb
was armed with a weapon.
5070 there. Car is stashed.
Yeah. We're gonna get him out.
- Get out!
- Get your hands out. Get out!
Get out!
I'm going to give you a goddamn
cigarette. Get your hands out.
Get out of the car!
Get out of the truck!
- Get out of the truck! Get out!
- I am! I am!
I am! I can't move that now!
I can't move that way!
- Get out of the truck!
- I can't move like that!
- Get out of the truck!
- I can't move like that!
- Get off me!
- Get off of the truck! Get off!
Get out of the truck!
Okay! Okay! I'm getting out!
I'm getting out!
- Come on! Come on!
- Okay! Help me get off!
Get off! Get off!
Get down!
The moment I felt that we finally had
the situation under control
was when we were walking him up
the embankment.
That's when I think everybody
kind of took a sigh of relief.
James, look at me.
We're going to walk over here.
So once the ambulance came,
they ascertained that his dog bite
needed some attention at the hospital.
The doctor found after doing
a blood test from Mr. Webb
that there were cannabinoids
and amphetamines in his system.
It's not a regular occurrence
for patrol officers in Wauconda
to be involved in pursuits.
But there are times
that warrant police pursuits,
and this was one of them.
James Webb was capable of
extreme violence.
The fact that no officers were injured,
no other citizens were injured,
is nothing short of a miracle
in my opinion.
I was extremely proud of the members
of the Wakanda Police Department.
because I believe in my heart that
if Mr. Webb got away,
somebody else would have been
injured or killed.
And it really was teamwork
that helped this entire situation
come to a good resolve.