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North Texas highway chase ends near Chatfield
With half a dozen law enforcement agencies chasing him, a Houston-area man led a medium-speed car chase from the Metroplex Friday, through the east residential neighborhood of Corsicana out towards Roane and finally ending just a few miles past Chatfield on FM 1129.
Clinton Middleton, 22, of Weimer was charged with evading arrest in Grayson County, a state jail felony, with a bond set at $10,000 by Navarro County Justice of the Peace Bob McQuary.
The chase was supposed to end in Corsicana, where Corsicana Police officers set tire spikes on Interstate 45 at Texas Highway 31, but as if the suspect knew what was ahead, he exited on the Roane Road and then led police on a rollicking chase through the eastern residential neighborhood of Corsicana.
As residents came out to look at the spectacle, three news helicopters circled overhead, giving a live account of the action to television viewers across North Texas, and dozens of police and sheriff’s cars from at least six agencies, as well as half a dozen news outlets, chased over and around. Eventually, the leader of the chase found his way back onto Martin Luther King Boulevard, then went north on I-45 before exiting again onto the Roane Road, this time heading east.
From the Roane Road, the young driver headed north on FM 1129 towards Chatfield.
Officers finally stopped the chase when an Ellis County deputy got in front of him, and another officer bumped his back fender, knocking him off the road.
“Van Alstyne did a pit maneuver, basically it’s a preventive maneuver and sent him into a grader ditch into two feet of water,” said Sheriff Les Cotten of Navarro County.
Even as he was pulled out of the car he was talking on his cell phone.
As he sat in the Van Alstyne patrol car, the young man talked to several of the reporters and photographers surrounding the vehicle.
“Why did you run?” one reporter asked.
“I didn’t want to go to jail,” he said, sounding exasperated. Middleton had at least one warrant out for his arrest before the chase.
The was taken to the Navarro County Regional Medical Center to be checked out, and was magistrated at the hospital Friday afternoon.
The chase began because the suspect left a gas station in Sherman without paying for his fuel, said Sgt. Kyle Babcock of the Melissa Police Department
No shots were fired during the chase, although one of his tires was punctured with tire spikes, causing him to run the last 15 or so miles with a flat tire, Cotten said.
Participating in the chase were officers from Van Alstyne, Melissa, Corsicana, Seven Points, Dallas County, Ellis County, Navarro County and the Department of Public Safety.
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