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Ingenious Car Theft Suspect Almost Evades Capture In Daring High Speed Police Pursuit in L.A. [Videos]

By Anne Sewell
Published on: 00:00 PST, Jun 5, 2016

It was like something straight out of the movies when a car thief, attempting to escape a police pursuit, was caught on aerial video footage in Los Angeles, California. While televised car chases are a pretty common thing in L.A., drivers (almost) escaping from them is a little more rare.

The crazy car chase happened on Friday, lasted for two hours, and the driver managed to evade capture – at least for a while.

According to a report by the Daily Mail, the suspect ran red lights, drove over sidewalks and medians and headed down the highway on the wrong side of the road as he went.

The police pursuit of the suspect was tracked by authorities and TV news helicopters, after the man stole a Honda Accord car in Lakewood. The suspect drove recklessly and erratically for an hour, hitting an armored car and another vehicle along the way.

As reported by the Los Angeles Times, at one stage, the driver even looked up and waved at the TV station helicopters following his journey and broadcasting the car chase live.

The car thief reportedly ended up in the hills above Whittier, driving along Turnbull Canyon Road.

At that stage, the driver slowed the vehicle in a tree-covered section of the road, apparently to evade surveillance and capture. However, the Honda Accord continued moving, as the man surreptitiously clambered out of the driver’s window.

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Reportedly, the stolen vehicle then coasted to a stop a little further down the road, crashing into an embankment, as the police pursuit continued.

It was at that stage that it was believed the man might have escaped the pursuit by police. However, minutes later, the suspect, who was reportedly wearing a Tony Romo Dallas Cowboys football jersey, was captured and taken into custody, his mad drive for freedom finally cut short.

At this stage, authorities have not named the man or said whether anyone was injured in the two traffic accidents during the police pursuit.

Several people following the man’s crazy car chase gave him full points for ingenuity, as his escape was so difficult to see live from the air. His actions were visible only in slow-motion replays, where the driver appears as a shadow across the driver’s door of the stolen vehicle.

His freedom was short lived after Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputies scoured the area around Blue Sky and Hollytree roads, weapons in hand, searching for the suspect until he was finally taken into custody.

[Photo Los Angeles Police helicopter via Flickr by Chris-Håvard Berge, cropped and resized/CC BY NC 2.0]

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