A high-speed police chase operation in Lee County, Florida, ended with a man jumping off a 17-meter-high bridge to evade arrest, according to helicopter footage.
Man jumps off 17-meter bridge into river after police pursuit
Officers were trying to stop Bryan Gray, 34, from driving a stolen pickup truck last week when he was chased off the Edison Bridge in Fort Myers.
Footage captured by a helicopter showed Gray’s pickup truck crash into the barrier on the right and again into the barrier on the left side of the bridge, which is 17 meters high.
One operator was heard telling his colleagues, “Ohhh… he crashed into the bridge, right now, he crashed into the bridge.”
A man, apparently Gray, was filmed running from the van towards the Edison Bridge barrier, from where he jumped, abandoning the allegedly stolen van.
After he jumped, the Fort Myers Police Department marine unit arrived on scene to pull Gray from the Caloosahatchee River.
He was arrested and transported to the hospital for treatment, the Lee County Sheriff’s Office said in a Facebook update Monday.
“While he may not have won a gold medal for his big jump, Gray earned charges of carjacking and eluding police,” the statement said.
Hundreds of Facebook users have shared the video of the high-speed chase, with one user writing, “Good job everyone. But the judges only gave him a score of 4.5 on the jump. he didn’t connect the landing!”.
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