02x04 - We Might Die Today

[bunniefuu]

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 f*cking stole this b*tch.

I just stole it right this second.

We're going f*cking 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, sh*t, 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 f*cking 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 g*n 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 k*lled.

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 f*cking cops off me,

I'm gonna sh**t this b*tch in the

face. You've got five seconds

to get off my a*s. Right now. I'm

not joking the f*ck around.

Get them off me now, or I'm

gonna sh**t this b*tch

in the face. I'm not playing! I

will sh**t her in the face!

Scream, b*tch!

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 g*n.

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 g*n.

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 g*n 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 k*ll 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 g*n?

- 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 f*cking 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 k*lled 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 f*cking ground!

Down on the ground, right now!

Get on the f*cking 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.