Riverside police arrested a man March 23 after he struck another vehicle, fled and evaded arrest.
Three officers were dispatched around 3:53 p.m. to the 3200 block of Harlem Avenue on a report of a hit-and-run with a car fleeing into Riverside after rear-ending another car. While en route, one officer located a car matching the description of the one that fled with front damage. After pulling the car over near the intersection of East Quincy Street and Riverside Road, the officer spoke with the driver while a BNSF train went by.
According to police, the man fled north in his car once the train passed, going around the gates that remained lowered due to another approaching train. As police followed, the car drove through the stop sign at East Burlington Street and Longcommon Road before turning right and going east.
Another officer found the car pulling over in front of Riverside Foods before it accelerated away as the officer approached in their squad car. The officer tried to block the man’s car from leaving, but it went around the squad car into the oncoming lane to get ahead. The officer followed the car to the corner of East Burlington Street and Cowley Road, where it once again ignored a stop sign before turning right and heading south. The car again drove around the lowered gates at the railroad crossing before ignoring another stop sign and turned left onto East Quincy Street to continue east.
The officer tried to pass the man’s car in order to slow down and stop it, but the car continued to weave into oncoming traffic. The car turned right to head south down Herbert Road; the officer continued east to try and block the car at the intersection of Delaplaine and Lawton roads but learned from another officer that the car had ignored the stop sign at the intersection of Lawton and Herbert roads before crashing into a tree.
Residents in the area told police the driver had fled south on foot through residential yards to Olmsted Road before heading east and turning south onto Delaplaine Road and east onto Blackhawk Road. An officer made contact with the man on the 400 block of Blackhawk Road; the officer saw the man had his hands in his pockets and threatened to tase the man if he did not get on the ground and place his hands behind his back.
Police arrested the man and found the keys to the crashed car on his person. The officer smelled alcohol on the man’s breath before police transported him to central lockup in Berwyn. While there, the man declined to take field sobriety tests and told police he did not know why he was being arrested and that he had not been driving.
Police charged the man with 17 citations for speeding, reckless and unpredictable driving, fleeing a crash, driving drunk, ignoring the lowered train gates, disregarding the stop signs, driving an uninsured vehicle and resisting arrest. They released him with a March 31 court date.
These items were obtained from the Riverside Police Department reports dated March 23; they represent a portion of the incidents to which police responded. Anyone named in these reports has only been charged with a crime and cases have not yet been adjudicated. We report the race of a suspect only when a serious crime has been committed, the suspect is still at large and police have provided us with a detailed physical description of the suspect as they seek the public’s help in making an arrest.
