Murphy – Being a passenger during a high-speed chase is not for the faint of heart.
Knuckles whiten from gripping the door handle. Legs cramp from trying to press the imaginary brake pedal. You dare not blink lest you miss something.
Perhaps that’s why a woman bailed out of a moving vehicle last week after the driver plowed through a barbed wire fence at the corner of Raper and Old Culberson roads. However, she soon realized she had nowhere to run, so she jumped back in the vehicle as it circled around to her while dodging horses and cows in a field.
“She decided running wasn’t for her,” Cherokee County Sheriff Derrick Palmer said.
The wild encounter was just one of three high-speed chases that kept local officers busy for an entire day last week. Deputies have been led on 15 high-speed chases so far this year, and officials believe word has spread that some agencies will no longer pursue suspects at a high rate of speed for an extended period of time.
“[The N.C.] Highway Patrol won’t chase anybody for any reason unless it’s approved by a supervisor for some type of major felony,”
Palmer said. “Our guys got to where they were not getting any help. They were calling people off when they got to the Georgia line, and I’ve seen a rash of chases since then.
“I think we’re going to have to develop the reputation that we’re not going to quit at the state line.”
First two chases
The first chase started around 11:15 a.m. April 7, when police noticed a car sans windshield leaving a known drug area. When a deputy initiated a traffic stop, the driver – later identified as 31-year-old Justin Ray Roberts – led police on a 20-minute chase that ended after authorities lost him on a gravel road leading into Georgia.
The second chase began almost immediately after the first ended. While authorities waited to see whether Roberts would re-enter North Carolina, a different vehicle crossed state lines from the direction he fled. When a deputy waved down the car to ask the occupants whether they had seen Roberts’ vehicle, the driver sped away.
The second chase also lasted about 20 minutes, with the driver – later identified as 30-year-old Jordan Daniel Mashburn – speeding down Spur 60 to Old Culberson Road before crashing through a fence at the Raper Road intersection. Video of the chase, reviewed by the Cherokee Scout, shows the occupants tossing items out of the window as the driver swerves across travel lanes at an unsafe speed.
A passenger, identified as 33-year-old Teresa Marie Loudermilk, hopped out of the car after it crashed through two fences, sending horses and cattle fleeing for their life. She jumped back into the vehicle after a brief run. Deputies surrounded the car a few seconds later and arrested the pair at gunpoint.
“The guy said, ‘I was so scared I didn’t know what to do,’ ” Palmer recalled. “I said, ‘What do you mean you didn’t know what to do? Stop.’ ”
The third chase
The third chase was actually a reboot of the first one. Around 3:50 p.m. deputies spotted Roberts, who was sitting in the vehicle with no windshield near Hardscrabble Road just across the Georgia line.
Deputies set up a parameter along all the roads that he would have to travel if he chose to return into North Carolina. Authorities then enlisted the help of Fannin County deputies to flush out Roberts, who left his parking spot mere seconds before Georgia authorities reached the location.
When Roberts saw the flashing lights, he turned onto Mount Herman Road and led police on a chase along winding roads before speeding up Georgia 60 back into Murphy. After he crossed the state line, Roberts avoided the spike strips police set up to stop him.
As a deputy attempted to stop the car with the force of his patrol vehicle, Roberts traveled onto the grass and his car tipped onto two wheels before coming to a halt near the Shady Grove Road intersection. Roberts then jumped out of the car and ran about 100 yards before being tackled by a deputy.
A group of bikers who were headed south on Georgia 60 during the chase turned around to thank police for apprehending Roberts, who had weaved in and out of traffic.
“I’m afraid that by not chasing cars and by not pursuing suspects, we’re giving people the green light to run,” Palmer said.
“We’re going to have to start making believers out of them again.”
After police placed Roberts in the rear of a patrol car, he repeatedly bashed his head against a window, forcing deputies to hobble him. Roberts was taken to a nearby hospital before being booked in the Cherokee County Detention Center a short time later.
Pursuit intervention
Meanwhile, a police K-9 alerted authorities to the possibility of drugs in Roberts’ car. However, nothing was found during a search.
“If someone spilled a little bit [of drugs] on the carpet, Bane would alert us; but it wouldn’t be enough where we could find it,” Lt. Tiffany Holland said. “It just shows that there has been a presence of narcotics.”
The sheriff said deputies are required to consider several factors such as traffic conditions, weather, time of day and threat to civilians before deciding whether to prematurely end a chase.
“If you know who it is you’re chasing and it’s getting too dangerous, you might call it off because you can take out warrants and pick him up later,” Palmer said, while explaining that there’s also a degree of liability for allowing a dangerous suspect to escape when there’s a possibility they may injure or kill someone if not apprehended.
“When it’s feasible and it’s safe, we’re going to continue the chase.”
With deputies being led on so many chases, Palmer said he plans to host a pursuit intervention technique training class this summer. Police sometimes use the PIT maneuver to stop a car with the force of their own vehicle. However, a lot of the younger deputies have never been through a training class on how to properly use the technique.