[narrator] In Wisconsin,
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
[police sirens]
[dispatcher speaking]
You’re in a position where you have to roll with the punches.
Then I can see him lean over in the cab.
It... It looks like he’s reaching over for something.
[gunshots firing]
[female officer speaking]
[narrator] In Tampa Bay, a suspect swims for his freedom.
[Officer Poveda speaking]
He’s underneath one of the docks.
This is a very dangerous situation.
We don’t have any idea if he’s armed.
[Officer Hobart yelling]
You’re in the waters and you may think there’s not gonna be a gator there,
Yes, there very well could.
[officer speaking]
[narrator] And a traffic stop in Iowa.
[Officer Hake speaking]
I wasn’t expecting what unfolded at all.
[male officer speaking]
[Officer Hake speaking]
[dispatcher] There’s cars on the west lane.
[officer 1] Shots fired. I only brought basic marks.
[officer 2] Yeah, drop it, come outside.
[narrator] Twenty-five miles east of Minneapolis...
...on the St. Croix river...
...lies Hudson, Wisconsin.
[Officer Bleskey] It was about, uh, 11:30 in the mornin’.
I heard a vehicle with loud exhaust coming from the rear.
I checked my side mirror and saw a, uh, gray Dodge 2500 pickup truck.
There was a BOLO issued from a county sheriff’s office for a gray Dodge 2500 pickup.
I called the plate into dispatch,
just a routine registration check.
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
[dispatcher speaking]
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
[dispatcher speaking]
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
[dispatcher speaking]
[Officer Bleskey] 10-4.
It’d been stolen as part of a burglary at an auto shop.
As soon as we hear stolen vehicle,
I think everybody, um, their ears perk up.
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
[dispatcher speaking]
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
[dispatcher speaking]
It definitely felt like a calm before the storm for me.
[dispatcher speaking]
[Officer Bleskey] When you turn on the lights and sirens...
...you get a lot of different reactions.
He guns it.
[siren wailing]
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
[dispatcher speaking]
Detective Bleskey had called it out right at that moment
that he was actively initiating a vehicle pursuit.
I’m anticipating that I am going to meet them on coming.
[dispatcher] Going eastbound. Stop at Wisconsin and Spruce at 11:12.
I turned around my squad car, activated my lights and siren again,
and began to pursue.
[Officer Speidel speaking]
[dispatcher speaking]
[Officer Speidel] I could see that he was picking up speed.
I don’t know what is coming up ahead,
as far as: Is there a lot of pedestrian traffic in that area?
Are there children out playing?
It definitely is a concern, uh, is the unknown, the uncertainty.
And you’re in a position where you have to roll with the punched.
[siren wailing]
[Officer Bleskey] He kinda starts slowing down a little bit.
And then all of a sudden, I could see his... his tires are just wobbling.
It kinda looked like his wheel was just gonna fall off.
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
It was at an auto shop when it had been stolen.
If his wheel fell off at that point...
...it’s gonna be an absolutely disaster.
But he just kept going.
He kinda starts slowing down.
And then I can see him kinda lean over in the cab.
It... It looks like he’s reaching over for something.
During the middle of a police chase,
I don’t know what else he would be reaching for other than a weapon.
We turn onto a... a dead end.
It’s just a farm field.
And then, uh, he just accelerated
and drove through the barbed wire fence.
[dispatcher speaking]
[Officer Speidel speaking]
Since I was driving a sedan,
I was gonna turn around and try to find an alternative route,
because it’s so low to the ground.
I did not believe the sedan would have been able to make it through the fields.
I had a few moments, internally, of anxiety and panic,
about leaving my partner.
I felt like I was abandoning him,
and that was a very difficult thing to do.
[Officer Bleskey] We’re driving about 50, 60 miles an hour through the field.
All I had to do was focus on my job,
which was... follow the... the vehicle.
[officer speaking]
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
So we... we drive through the field,
kinda a straight shot through the field.
We come up to a road.
Truck is smoking pretty heavy.
It looked like some major mechanical damage on the vehicle.
The truck... did not... quit.
It seemed like this guy isn’t gonna stop
until... you know, we do some kind of intervention.
[dispatcher speaking]
For him to drive off the end of the driveway
and into backyard put people at great risk.
[dispatcher speaking]
I still... couldn’t say 100% certain
that there wasn’t a weapon somewhere in that vehicle.
[police siren wailing]
[Officer Bleskey] When I saw him start lining up with that tree,
that was my chance to stop his vehicle.
I knew I had pinned his truck. I had aimed right for his back wheels.
And I hit him pretty square.
[female officer] Dispatch for 20 East, we’re still on the way there.
[dispatcher speaking]
Exited the car, posted up, had my gun drawn,
trying to shout commands.
I still couldn’t say 100% certain
that there wasn’t a weapon somewhere in that vehicle.
And then I hear gunshots.
[female officer speaking] Coming in, shots fired.
[gunshots firing]
[female officer speaking]
I heard... one gunshot, right away.
And then I heard...
It... It sounded like it might have been two more after that.
[female officer speaking]
[two gunshots firing]
[female officer speaking]
Not even a quarter mile I would say, before I got there,
that’s when I heard over the radio...
um, "Shots fired".
My concerns, when I hear shots fired, always is going to be...
"Is the scene safe?
Is everybody okay? Are any of the officers injured?"
At that time, I had my gun out,
because I’m in a deadly force potential situation.
[Officer Bleskey] He’s got a tree on his driver’s side.
And then he’s got squads...
...on all three other sides.
The investigators that had boxed him in,
were... were set up, had positions of cover.
He must have tried to pull on one of ’em.
Pull the weapon. Pull the gun.
And investigators were responding with gunshots.
[female officer speaking]
[gunshots firing]
[female officer speaking]
[Officer Bleskey] Saw the lieutenant
from the St. Croix county sheriff’s office, was knelt down.
Had his gun pointed at the truck tire.
[lieutenant speaking]
[Officer Speidel] I see one of the, uh, St. Croix county investigators...
...pulling on the... the driver-side door to try and get it open.
[dispatcher speaking]
[Officer Bleskey] To see it on his face that he realized
that this was, in fact, the end.
And that he put his hands up and said, "I quit. I’m done."
[siren wailing]
[Officer Bleskey speaking]
[Officer Speidel] There wasn’t an engagement between suspect and officers.
He had shot out the tire.
[female officer speaking]
[gunshots firing]
[female officer speaking]
[Officer Bleskey] We searched him.
There wasn’t any weapons or anything of significance on him.
[narrator] The suspect is Cassidy Mickey.
He pleads guilty to operating a vehicle without consent,
and recklessly endangering safety.
He is sentenced to 18 months in prison.
[Officer Speidel] It stands out as...
...one of the most memorable chases I’ve been a part of.
[Officer Bleskey] I couldn’t see that whole situation turning out any better.
Nobody got hurt.
I never want to have to use deadly force.
I made it through... a tour in Iraq, and...
...several years in law enforcement,
never had to use it.
If I can go through my whole life and never have to kill anybody,
I’d... be very happy.
[narrator] On the west coast of Florida’s Tampa Bay...
...is the city of Saint Petersburg.
[Officer Poveda] I just finished a regular shift.
I was... heading home.
I leave the station around 3 P. M.
So as I’m leaving St. Petersburg,
I’m coming into the bridge area, Gandy bridge.
I notice a highway patrol cruiser was doing a traffic stop.
My job is to assist, you know, sometimes traffic stops are dangerous.
As soon as I made the U-turn, I noticed the trooper had exited his car,
and was running full sprint behind the driver.
[highway patrol officer speaking]
[Officer Poveda speaking]
I’m faster than the highway patrol man...
...because I’m in a car. [chuckles]
So, I’m... I’m able to pass him.
And I... as I pass him...
...the driver then jumped a chain link fence...
Which was approximately six feet.
...into a business.
There’s only one reason to run from a traffic stop,
and that is because you’re wanted.
[highway patrolman speaking]
[Officer Poveda speaking]
There’s a lotta yachts.
And there’s a lotta places to hide.
[highway patrolman speaking]
[Officer Poveda speaking]
I looked over and he’s underneath one of the docks.
This is a very dangerous situation.
We don’t have any idea if he’s armed.
There’s... There’s definitely a lot of questions in my... in my mind at this point.
Why this person is running.
[highway patrolman speaking]
[Officer Poveda speaking]
We gotta start thinking long term here.
If this guy decides to get back on land,
we’re gonna need extra officers.
Oh, we gotta get over there.
[man] Oh!
[Officer Poveda speaking]
[highway patrolman speaking]
[Officer Poveda speaking]
He’s kinda struggling. He’s not looking too good of a swimmer.
I’ve gotten in the water before
and it’s very dangerous.
Most patrol officers are not trained
in a water survival situation.
We carry about 40 to 50 pounds of weight all together.
uh, the vest, and the... and the belt,
and we would have to take our equipment off.
And, also, we don’t know if he’s armed or not.
To be fighting with somebody that doesn’t wanna get out of the water...
I don’t want to put myself at risk, or any one of us, uh, by... by that matter.
He was going from one dock to the next dock.
And the extra officers are arriving... were arriving to the west.
[Officer Griffin] As I arrive on scene, I see the subject in the water.
There’s a few other St. P officers kinda sprinkled about.
Um, the calvary’s not there, um, just yet.
[Officer Poveda speaking]
[suspect speaking]
[Officer Poveda speaking]
We needed boats and we needed boats, like, now.
That can corner and surround him,
or at least just, kinda, keep him contained in the one area,
or heck, why he’s even in the water.
[Officer Poveda speaking]
As he takes off, I see that he’s not that good of a swimmer.
He’s... struggling.
And at one point his head goes down.
My first instinct was, "I’m gonna need to jump in the water and go get him."
Try to save his life, ’cause now he’s... he’s putting his life at risk,
because he’s trying to get away from us,
and made a really poor decision.
[officer 1 speaking]
[officer 2] Just give him the life vest.
[Officer Poveda] Still don’t know if he’s armed.
We don’t know what his intentions are.
[officer 1 speaking]
The look of seeing a man who... can’t swim,
he’s tired...
...and now ignoring lifesaving attempts, was... was pretty dramatic.
[officer 1 speaking]
[officer 2 speaking]
When I get there the... the suspect
was probably about 25 to 30 yards away from the dock.
[Officer Poveda speaking]
[Officer Hobart speaking]
[Officer Poveda speaking]
[Officer Hobart] What was shocking to me is that, it being December,
being... the water being cold, the air being cold,
that somebody would take drastic measures like going into the water
in an attempt to get away from police officers.
[officer speaking]
We as police officers have a duty to protect and serve,
[Officer Poveda] The decision had to be made, and, uh, Officer Hobart...
...and one of the troopers, decided to try to get him.
[Officer Hobart] None of us are part of the Coast Guard,
we don’t have that kind of training.
I reverted back to some previous training
that I had as a lifeguard for several years.
I felt that I was in a position
where I could do the most good for the situation.
So I passed off my vest, and my gun belt to Officer Poveda,
and, uh, jumped in the water.
[Officer Poveda] I think that’s prudent,
as far as, like, having two officers go in there instead of just one.
I don’t wanna put any one of us at risk.
We don’t know if he’s armed or not.
Um, he’s really trying to do everything he can to get away from us,
and I mean everything.
[officer speaking]
At this point, the... the suspect has entered the mangroves,
and has gone out of sight.
[officer 1 speaking]
[Officer Poveda speaking]
[officer 2 speaking]
-[beeping] -[trooper] Look at that.
[Officer Hobart] I’m with the trooper now,
we’re... we paired up a two officer approach.
The helicopter has been circling.
It’s trying to use its tools that it has, like thermal imaging.
Basically, he ran from a traffic stop.
I don’t know if he’s armed,
or if he’s potentially super dangerous person.
And the canopy of these mangroves, are just making it...
...impossible to locate him.
[Officer Hobart yelling]
[trooper yelling]
[Officer Hobart] Eventually the Florida Wildlife cops show up.
They take a couple officers from the docks,
and they take the... the east side of the mangroves.
[Griffin] [bleep]
Strange.
And we have this perimeter set up around the mangroves,
trying to get an eye on the suspect.
[indistinct conversation]
[Griffin] It was about 3:30 or so.
It was still very, very bright,
but here in Florida the sun,
when it goes down it goes down very quickly.
[Griffin]
[bleep]
[Hobart]
[Griffin] If we don’t find this guy by nightfall
all of our units are gonna have to come out.
One, just because it’s not safe.
[Griffin] An unfamiliar area, you’re in the water,
so it’s just you’ve got so many negatives kind of against you.
Gators are definitely common and you may think, "Oh," you know, "Salt water.
There’s not gonna be a gator there."
Yes, there very well could. So in that particular area, with it being so shallow,
jellyfish, stingrays.
The last thing you want to do is kind of willingly continue
to put yourself in a situation like that once sundown comes.
[bleep]
[Griffin]
[Hobart]
[Poveda]
[bleep]
[indistinct radio conversation]
We had a helicopter, three boats,
and several officers, and we couldn’t find this guy.
[Hobart]
[Griffin]
-[Hobart] -[Griffin]
The sun’s going down, the situation’s getting more dangerous.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[Hobart] Out of the corner of my eye, I see movement north of me.
And I don’t have my radio so I’m just kind of yelling out.
[bleep]
[Hobart] So then we pop out behind him,
and everybody just kind of converges.
I see him running across towards the other island.
[man screaming]
[man shouting] Okay, just stop.
[indistinct shouting]
I can’t move.
[Hobart] I hear a distinctive pop sound
from what I knew to be a taser.
[indistinct conversation]
Let’s go. Come on. Here you go.
-Will you listen to any of our problems? -Hang on.
Johnson, where’d you go?
[Hobart] I look down at how sharp these oysters are,
and his feet are all cut up, and he’s bleeding.
[Hobart] And then we put him on a boat,
and we got him back to the shore.
It’s a really cool feeling to know that several agencies were involved in this,
wearing several different badges
and answering to several different people.
[narrator] Rashaan Cutler was pulled over for a minor window tint violation.
Running and then swimming away from police
made things much more serious for him.
Cutler was charged
with unlawful possession of personal identification information
possession of methamphetamine, possessing forged notes, bills, checks, or drafts,
driving with a suspended license, and resisting arrest.
He’s sentenced to 297 days in jail.
Just very happy that he was in custody,
that we’re gonna be able to resolve this
the way it should have been resolved in the beginning,
and then we can all go home now.
[narrator] Tucked in the northeast corner of Iowa...
Is the town of Fayette.
[Hake] July 12th, 2021
I was doing a 6PM to 2AM shift,
patrolling the town, when I responded to a call.
[Hake]
[Hake] They’d had a theft.
[door buzzes]
[Hake]
[Hake] Okay.
[Hake]
[Hake] I looked at the surveillance footage,
and I was able to visibly see the suspect.
[Hake]
[woman] Yeah.
I observed a woman take some little things.
The stuff probably didn’t even amount to $10.
It was a very weird scenario.
Called in dispatch and they weren’t able to have anything pop up
with the exact letters that I gave,
but they did find a Jeep similar to it.
It was just one letter off.
Without a concrete license plate number,
it’s very hard to be able to track down that suspect.
An hour and a half later, the on-call officer had come in.
She told me that there was a car sitting up on highway 150,
so just to do a little check
and make sure the driver was okay.
I approached a white Jeep.
I called in the plate to dispatch
and let them know my location,
and as I was walking up it sort of started clicking in the back of my mind,
like, "Okay, this vehicle matches the description in the gas station."
Normally, you walk up on motorists,
and you tap, and they tell ya,
"Oh, I’m just getting directions, I’m fine."
Or, "This happened" and they need some help.
This female that’s sitting in the car
is a dead match for the person that I had seen
on the footage in the gas station.
She looked at me and we locked eyes.
I wasn’t expecting what unfolded at all.
[Hake] And so I ran back to my car,
-initiated my lights and sirens, -[siren wails]
and called in the license plate that I saw.
[Hake] So, I initiated the 10-80.
10-80 is a vehicle pursuit.
[Thyer] At that point,
when she was heading out of the town of Fayette,
Officer Hake was by herself.
Driver stops
are extremely dangerous situations.
You know, an officer in Fayette
could be alone for an extended period of time before help can get there.
All the officers in the county are scrambling,
trying to get in a position where they can help her.
I was working nightshift as normal.
I was about 12 miles away from her,
south of Fayette.
And then when I heard that, at my location in the county,
I started heading in her direction.
In those situations you just never know what’s gonna happen.
[woman on radio]
When a suspect runs it does make us assume or think
that maybe there’s something else going on that we don’t know about yet.
[Hake] Does she have a gun in the car?
Is she a wanted person for murder?
You never know who’s in the vehicle,
and so I was trying to revert back
to all the training that you’ve had.
She’s telling us the locations,
still northbound on highway 150,
heading towards West Union.
[woman on radio]
Can see them from a distance just coming down the road.
It was getting closer and closer to my Stop Sticks.
I knew I had it in the right position.
[Thyer on radio]
They struck both of the front tires.
[man on radio]
And I got to see the tire roll off the car,
and I’m like, "All right, we got one."
[Hake] I was expecting having no tires
would throw the car off into the ditch
or something of that sort.
And the vehicle was still going after that.
[woman on radio]
[Davis] So, you try to do the best you can.
Are you guaranteed to hit every tire? No.
But the goal is to at least try to hit one or two
because even at one or two
it still slows that vehicle down quite a bit.
[Hake] Luckily, she rolled to a stop
right across from the nursing home in Fayette.
[woman on radio]
[Thyer shouting]
I start yelling at the driver to open the door
because I could still see her hands
still just clenched on that steering wheel.
[Hake and Thyer]
We were both yelling at the suspect to get out of the car,
and the suspect wasn’t listening.
Tried to open up the door, it was locked.
So at that point in time I got out my baton
and then I started hitting the window.
[Erica]
Approaching a vehicle should never be routine, especially at night.
You never know what you’re rolling up on.
[Hake] Specifically during traffic stops
is when you would find somebody that has a warrant for guns, or drugs,
or sometimes you find someone with wanted for murder.
So I was grateful that I had as many people behind me in the pursuit as I did.
[Erica]
[Davis]
[Erica]
[Davis]
-[Erica] -[Davis]
When I arrived on scene the scene was secure.
It wasn’t crazy anymore.
[indistinct conversation]
-[Thyer] -[Erica]
[Barker] So, as we’re clearing the scene
I notice a vehicle that’s headed towards me...
and it wasn’t slowing down.
We’re concerned that this vehicle might hit us.
So as the vehicle’s approaching
we get our flashlights out,
and we step to the side of the road
where we want the vehicle to come to
where they can see us.
We’re flashing our flashlights at them...
for them to slow down.
The person actually gained speed.
[Barker] At this point I’m thinking,
"Are the two drivers connected?"
This vehicle drives through our crime scene.
They almost strike a deputy and another officer.
I couldn’t believe that the car just sped through.
We want to know what’s going on.
Complete disregard to law enforcement all together.
I run to my vehicle, I get in the vehicle,
-and then I go after the car that just fled the scene. -[siren wailing]
It’s just me. All the other officers in the county are behind me,
dealing with that crime scene.
I can’t believe this is happening.
You know, we just got done with one high speed chase and starting up another one.
[man on radio]
[Barker on radio]
[siren wailing]
[woman on radio]
I take Erica Slack to jail right away,
and on my way
I’m probably about three, four miles out
from the jail.
I hear another officer say, "I’m in pursuit of another vehicle
going northbound on highway 150,
going over 100 miles an hour."
And I’m the closest one.
[chuckling] You’ve got to be kidding me.
And I know as sooner we got to the end of the road from the Sheriff’s Office,
and here goes this red car just [whooshes]
zipping right by.
And then there goes Officer Barker. It was perfect timing.
I seen Deputy Thyer, and I’m relieved to see that we have another officer
that could be in on the chase.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[Barker] As we get closer to West Union,
I’m more worried about people being on the roadway, people and being in cars,
and I know we have to get this vehicle stopped soon.
[woman on radio]
[Barker]
[woman on radio]
[Thyer] This vehicle was all over the road, running every stop sign.
If there was a stop light to run it ran it.
This was gonna be a dirty one.
We started driving through smaller neighborhoods.
The vehicle attempted to allude me,
going down several small streets,
and we made our way down a road
that was a cul-de-sac.
And I knew that, at the time, I was getting prepared for them to turn around.
You basically, at that point when you’re desperate,
you’ll do anything to get away from law enforcement.
And then when they realized that,
they started slowing down and then going through people’s front yards.
I saw where it was going, and I decided to get there before he did
and try to attempt a pit maneuver.
I’m hoping to slow it down,
maybe disable it, maybe disable the driver.
I didn’t want to hit it too hard
because there was a house right behind it.
I hit the vehicle, I hit the driver’s side door, it loses control,
and I notice that there’s a driver
and a passenger inside the vehicle.
[Thyer] Spins them out a little bit,
but then it crashes right into me,
and I quickly divert to not hit the passenger door.
And it pushes the vehicle back straight,
and the vehicle then now goes back out the way it came.
[Barker] I go around Deputy Thyer
and get behind the vehicle once again.
He’s starting to drive erratically,
he’s swerving all over the road,
so I’m starting to think that my hit maneuver
might have affected him in some way.
We are concerned for the public’s safety at that point.
I started backing up, I started slowing down,
but still maintaining visual contact with the vehicle.
[siren wailing]
After we decided that we’re gonna slow it down a little bit
and I give him a little bit more space,
I saw there was headlights dancing in the sky.
By the time I got there,
he was on the other side of the road
in the ditch.
[Thyer] He tried to turn late.
He then jumped the road and went into the ditch on the other side.
[tires screeching]
[crashing]
[Thyer]
-[Barker] -[Thyer]
[Barker] [bleep]
[Thyer] Knowing how many people are in the vehicle,
it changes how you’re gonna react
and how you’re gonna respond to the situation.
[Thyer]
[Barker]
-[man] -[Barker]
[Barker] We opened their doors
and pulled ’em out the vehicle.
Well, I definitely feel relieved at this point,
knowing that everyone’s going to be safe,
the pursuit was over,
and they had no weapons on them.
-[Thyer] No? -Yeah.
[woman on radio]
The reason why the driver had fled through the crime scene that we had
was because he had warrants out
for Black Hawk County for robbery.
[narrator] The driver in the second pursuit, Diontay Cobbs,
is charged with alluding
and possession of a controlled substance.
Cobbs’ passenger, Kayci Hahn, is charged with possession of a controlled substance.
[Davis] But this is crazy.
[man on radio]
I haven’t even heard of a double 10-80, all within two hours, ever,
especially in our area.
It was definitely something
that I couldn’t believe happened.
Open the door.
[narrator] The suspect in the first pursuit
is Erica Slack.
She receives a deferred judgement
with one year probation
and a $430 fine for alluding law enforcement.
This night was one of the biggest moments
in my career.
-I can’t ... -On the ground.
-To the ground. -[Thyer] To the ground.
-Hands behind your back. -Hands behind your back.
I was very proud of them that night.
They did a great job.