April 08--It had all the ingredients for a classic, made-for-Los-Angeles police chase: a convertible with its top down performing doughnuts on Sunset Boulevard, people cheering from the sidewalk, a leisurely cruise past the Hollywood Walk of Fame and a close call with a TMZ tour bus.
Naturally, the rainy-day chase ended on a narrow neighborhood street with two suspects sharing hugs and handshakes with a growing crowd -- and lots of selfies. The wild pursuit ended with the two men surrendering to sheriff's deputies without incident.
The chase lasted about 90 minutes and began with a report of a residential burglary in Cerritos about 2 p.m. about an hour after a rainstorm moved into Southern California.
Authorities said streets were too wet and the Ford Mustang was weaving through traffic too dangerously for sheriff's deputies to follow it, so they relied on a helicopter to monitor the vehicle instead.
But when the chase moved downtown where the 110 and 101 freeways converge, the California Highway Patrol joined the chase and the suspects exited at Sunset Boulevard. By that time they had already rear-ended one vehicle and the passenger had stood up and waved at other drivers.
On Sunset, with no police behind them, the driver began doing doughnuts in the middle of the street, spinning across all lanes of traffic and forcing other cars to stop. The car then moved onto Hollywood Boulevard, where countless tourists got to see the Mustang drive against traffic by the TCL Chinese Theater and Hollywood Walk of Fame.
From there, it was up to the Hollywood Hills, where the Mustang drove into opposite lanes around blind curves, narrowly missing oncoming traffic, and fish-tailed out of control on rain-soaked roads.
Without any vehicles close behind, the driver drove back through Hollywood's tourist district and back onto the freeway, where it was almost trapped by a TMZ tour bus that cut off its path as it tried to split two lanes.
TMZ addressed the run-in with the pursuit suspects on its website.
"We've spoken to the driver ... who says he never even saw the chase coming behind him. He was innocently changing lanes, and ended up cutting off the suspects," TMZ said.
The pursuit suspects then sped onto Figueroa Street by USC, where LAPD officers twice tried to deploy spike strips to no avail. Somewhere along the way, however, the car's front right tire was thrashed. The car was driving on its rim by the time it reached 51st Street and Central Avenue at 3:30 p.m., where the driver and passenger were met by a throng of bystanders. Police were nowhere in sight.
"I have been involved in a lot of pursuits but I haven't seen anything quite like that," said Dennis Zine, a former city councilman with a combined 47 years of service with the LAPD as an officer and reserve. "The high fives at the end were ridiculous."
LAPD Capt. Andy Neiman said the long delay between the men stopping and their arrest was deliberate. The men were in LAPD territory but were being chased for a crime outside the department's jurisdiction, he said.
"It was a nonviolent property crime.... in terms of priority, you need to weigh all the circumstances. The two suspects didn't appear to be trying to hide anywhere, almost sitting and waiting. You could see them take property out of their pockets and hand it to people like they knew they were going to be arrested," Neiman said. "It was sort of surreal to watch."
After hugging bystanders and taking selfies, the men crossed their hands behind their backs and approached sheriff's deputies, who had just arrived to take them into custody.
