Roughly two dozen Anchorage police officers and two K9 teams swarmed a neighborhood near Tudor Road and Lake Otis Parkway Wednesday night. They were searching for a suspect involved in another car theft.
It all started when an officer driving behind the suspect ran his plates and discovered the red SUV was stolen. But before the chase even started, the driver started driving erratically, through a hedge of trees and into a neighborhood on 40th Avenue, where he ditched the car and ran.
Police searched the neighborhood, yard by yard, while some residents sat out with snacks and watched. Sergio Acuña’s SUV, stored under a tarp in his backyard, didn’t look disturbed from his kitchen window, so he wasn’t concerned when police searched and then moved on.
He said on the other side of the vehicle is where he found the driver door of the vehicle closed over the tarp, which he said is not how it is normally attached. The man had been hiding in the car and waited for police to leave before making a run for it.
“I turn around and my wife is having a freak out like, ‘Somebody came out of the vehicle!’ and I’m like, ‘What?’ So I run right away, not to try to get involved with it, but to alert the officers,” Acuña said.
The suspect didn’t get far before APD caught him.
“We were lucky, we probably had 20, 20 to 25 officers here really quick. It helped us lock him down,” said Sgt. Shaun Henry.
The next challenge facing police is figuring out who the man is. Officers said he refused to tell them his name, and didn’t have any identifying materials on him. They’re hoping his passenger, who they detained, can help. Or another clue he left behind in Acuña car: a black computer case or briefcase with a wallet in it and an ID that doesn’t belong to the suspect, according to Acuña.
Police have not said what charges the suspect will face.
KTVA 11′s Daniella Rivera can be reached via email or on Facebook and Twitter.
