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Woman in stolen and unique SUV brake-checks MSP trooper, leads chase
The Michigan State Police said a woman who was driving a stolen SUV with a very unique paint job led police on a high-speed chase after brake-checking an MSP trooper.
JACKSON, Mich. (FOX 2) - The Michigan State Police made a unique arrest last Friday night when troopers caught up to a woman who intentionally brake-checked a fully-marked trooper in a stolen SUV that had the ‘Pennywise’ from the movie "It" painted on its hood.
The brilliant blue of an MSP vehicle isn't easy to miss - especially with the red cherry on top and the big words "police" emblazoned on the front, side, and back of the cars. So imagine how surprising it was for an MSP trooper when a woman intentionally brake-checked him in a stolen car and then led a high-speed chase.
It was around 7:30 p.m. on Friday when a trooper in a fully marked cruiser was driving on a two-lane highway near Jackson.
"(He) was actually leaving a shop with a cop. He was off duty heading home from this event," MSP Lt. Robert Bow said.
As the trooper was leaving in his brightly painted and hard-to-miss car, he looked behind him and saw another unique and hard-to-miss vehicle. It was a red SUV with ‘Pennywise’ painted on the front and the words "You'll float too" painted on it.
It's owned by Jerry Winchester but he wasn't driving it that night.
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Police said it had been stolen by 34-year-old Shannon Overton. Winchester said she literally took it away from him as he was in the car.
"I was in the driver's seat and I saw in my mirror, her go right behind my car. So I jumped out to see what she was doing behind my car," he said. "We grabbed a hold of the car, punching windows, trying to break the window to stop her, she drug us out to the road."
After Winchester let go, Overton allegedly encountered the state trooper and she was very erratic behind the wheel and even tried to pass the trooper on the two-lane road.
"The driving is pretty erratic, quickly speeds up and catches up to him and flashes his brights," Bow said. "(Then she) spikes the brakes on the trooper causing him to rear end the vehicle."
Michigan State Police said Shannon Overton stole a car painted the face of 'Pennywise' and then brake-checked an MSP trooper before leading a police chase at high-speeds.
Suddenly, the off-duty trooper is on the job.
"After the collision the vehicle ended up taking off at a high rate of speed," Bow said.
The chase went for miles and the trooper radioed ahead to contact the Monroe County Sheriff and Dundee Police. Police used stop sticks twice an ultimately ended the chase near Secur and Rauch in Bedford Township where Overton was arrested.
She was charged with four felonies, assault, assault with a weapon on a police officer, fleeing and evading, and driving a stolen vehicle.
"You never know who you are dealing with. It's hard to say if there's is some sort of unfortunate mental problem we're dealing with - or narcotics or alcohol - it could a slew of things. Or someone had a bad day and they broke," Bow said. "This job is very unpredictable. Sometimes things don’t go as planned but we are always trying to think about public safety when we are doing this type of work."
Police are still trying to determine what was behind all of this and they consider this case very active and open at this time.
As for Winchester, it's unknown if he'll be getting his special car back or not but police are doing everything in their power to do so.