Four Florida teenagers lost their lives during a high-speed police chase in a stolen SUV that ended in a rollover and collision into a concrete utility pole.
On April 20th, deputies were alerted to a stolen Honda CRV in Gainesville, Florida.
Deputies from Bradford County Sheriff’s Office quickly located the vehicle using a license plate scanner just hours after it was reported stolen.
As deputies attempted to pull the car over, it appeared to slow down momentarily, only to suddenly accelerate, reaching speeds of 111 mph.
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Deputies were unable to match the SUV’s speed because of the governors on their patrol cars, and they called for backup from the Florida Highway Patrol (FHP).
According to the Florida Highway Patrol, a trooper joined the pursuit and “identified that some of the occupants appeared to be wearing ski masks.”
According to WCJB, two of the teenagers in the SUV were wearing ankle monitors, and three had active warrants.
“The Trooper made intentional contact with the Honda, causing it to decelerate,” the Highway Patrol said in a statement. “The Trooper used the break in speed to perform a Precision Immobilization Technique (PIT maneuver) on the fleeing Honda to stop the threat created by the fleeing suspect. The Honda subsequently rolled over before making contact with a cement pole.”
The impact was so severe that the car wrapped around the pole, leaving the four teenagers inside with fatal injuries. It took Alachua County Fire Rescue more than 90 minutes to remove the four occupants from the stolen SUV.
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Two of the teens died at the scene in the Waldo area, while the other two succumbed to their injuries at UF Health Shands Hospital a few days later.
All of the victims in the crash were aged 14 to 16.
Two of them have been identified: Jabril Cheevers and Lawrence McClendon Jr., a sophomore defensive back for the football team whose 18-year-old brother, Jermaine Godbolt, was shot and died last month, according to the Main Street Daily News.
“It’s concerning when you have so many deaths back to back, but all we can do as a community is wrap our arms around each other, love each other, ask ourselves what we need to be doing, and then do it,” Newberry Mayor Jordan Marlowe, who teaches at the school, told the paper on Thursday.
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