2 Sideswipes & A Machete

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by Staff | Aug 5, 2012 12:07 am

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Posted to: The Hill

Avital Silverman Photos It began with an SUV driver driving onto a busy sidewalk while fleeing cops. It ended, after much commotion, with a Yale shuttle bus hitting a cop car.

That wild scene took place on Cedar Street by Yale-New Haven Hospital earlier this week.

It began on the Boulevard at 7:30 a.m.

Here’s what happened, according to Lt. Jeff Hoffman:

Officer Mark O’Neill was on a motorcycle doing speed enforcement near Orange Avenue Tuesday morning when he saw a driver in a green Ford Explorer pick-up truck traveling 57 miles per hour. The speed limit there is 35.

O’Neill motioned the drive to pull over. He did.

O’Neill asked to see his license, registration and insurance. The driver fumbled with the papers—then put the truck in gear and drove off.

So O’Neill radioed a description of the truck, and cops throughout the area started looking for it.

Some officers spotted the pick up on Congress Avenue by Cedar Street. It was stuck in traffic. The cops closed in.

At which point the Explorer driver pulled into reverse and drove onto Cedar—on the sidewalk, toward where the food vendors set up.

He could drive only so far: cement pillars by York Street blocked him in. So he hopped out of the car and ran west on York Street, jumping over a cement wall onto a roof.

A group of New Haven and Yale cops and hospital security officers caught up with him.

Officers searched the Explorer. They found marijuana in it—and a machete.

Now the man, who’s 28 years old, was really in trouble. He was hauled off to the police station and booked on a variety of charges.

As police searched his vehicle, which was subsequently towed, a Yale shuttle bus driver tried to turn from Cedar onto York—and hit Officer E.J. Carter’s police cruiser. He had parked it there to go run after the Explorer driver.

It was a minor sideswipe, according to Hoffman—a “paint transfer.” The shuttle also sideswiped a car parked across the narrow street. The shuttle driver had tried to squeeze in between. No one was hurt.

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