A Yonkers man was arrested Wednesday, Aug. 27, after he injured a Maryland sheriff’s deputy in a police pursuit on I-95.
Harford County Sheriff Jeff Gahler, of Harford County, Maryland, said Juan Yahir Quiroz Manzueta, 21, of Yonkers hit several vehicles as he attempted to flee from sheriff’s deputies in a rented Penske box truck on I-95 Tuesday in Churchville, Maryland.
Gahler said police attempted to stop Quiroz Manzueta around 11:30 a.m. after Lt. Robert Burgess saw the rental truck “driving erratically and in an unsafe manner.”
Police say Quiroz Manzueta led officers on a car chase through the municipality and onto I-95 south near Aberdeen, Maryland, where he began to drive erratically in the wrong direction.
During the pursuit, Quiroz Manzueta hit a U.S. Mail truck and a vehicle with passengers, which resulted in no injuries.
Truck driven by Yonkers man hits Maryland sheriff’s deputy
Once on I-95, Maryland State Police joined the pursuit. The box truck hit Burgess, the sheriff’s deputy, as he was outside of his vehicle attempting to deploy stop sticks on the highway. Burgess was thrown 65 feet into the air, according to Maryland State Police.
“We are fortunate that we are not talking about a police officer fatality today,” Gahler said in a press conference Tuesday, according to CBS News Baltimore. “This suspect did his very best to kill a police officer, and just fell short.”
A pit maneuver from one of the officers on scene, a police driving tactic meant to stop fleeing vehicles, eventually stopped Quiroz Manzueta’s truck, Gahler said. Quiroz Manzueta then fled on foot down a nearby hill called someone to pick him up and drive him back to New York.
During the investigation, officers said they identified Quiroz Manzueta as the suspect through GPS tracking information after they found his fingerprints in the truck, along with a smashed cellphone.
Did oil theft play role in Yonkers man’s Maryland chase?
Police say Quiroz Manzueta may have been involved in a theft at an Applebee’s in Aberdeen after stolen cooking oil was found in the truck.
Gahler told reporters in Maryland that there is a “high demand” for cooking oil on the black market as it is used to make biodiesels, animal feed, soaps and detergents. The discovery of the oil led Quiroz Manzueta to be linked to similar robberies in other states.
U.S. Marshals arrested Quiroz Manzueta at an apartment in New Rochelle Wednesday morning. He was charged with attempted murder and assault on law enforcement and is awaiting extradition back to Maryland.
“We use the word crash and we use the word accident, these were intentional acts by a criminal attempting to elude arrest,” Gahler said during the Tuesday press conference in Harford County. “And there will be charges on each one of these assaults.”
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Yonkers man charged with slamming into Maryland deputy with box truck in high-speed chase
Reporting by Alexandra Rivera, Rockland/Westchester Journal News / Rockland/Westchester Journal News
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