Patrol-Car Bandit Busted… and Jailed
By Robyn Moormeister - Santa Cruz Sentinel - 10/28/03
A Santa Cruz man accused of stealing a California Highway Patrol car Tuesday, prompting a four-day, countywide manhunt, was arrested Saturday afternoon at a Santa Cruz McDonald’s.
This time, he did not escape.
John Vincent Smith, 50, was spotted by an off-duty Santa Cruz police officer at 3 p.m. riding in a green pickup on Graham hill Road – minus the handcuffs he wore when he was last seen in Bonny Doon last week.
Smith had been picked up by CHP Tuesday near the front entrance of Lockheed Martin driving a stolen Volvo. When he complained of heat after CHP officer Jim Crouch cuffed him and put him in the front seat of his patrol car, Crouch left the car running – keys in the ignition – so the air conditioning would cook Smith. Smith drove away.
Crouch chased after him, but was unable to catch him.
At hour later, the car was found in a ravine off Jamison Creek Road, approximately three miles from Lockheed Martin. Smith was nowhere to be found.
After arresting Smith on Saturday, CHP officers surmised that he had hiked at least a half-mile and probably more through the woods from Jamison Creek Road to the Boulder Creek Golf and Country Club at 16901 Big Basin Highway.
Paul Novie, golf director at the club, said a few residents had called police when they saw a man come out of the woods and wash himself in a country club pool that afternoon.
"There were a couple of sightings," Novie said.
"(Residents) weren’t sure it was him, but it looked suspicious. The cops were all over this place."
CHP Sgt. Kevin Enox said Smith traveled to San Jose the next day, but returned to Santa Cruz sometime after that.
After the off-duty officer spotted Smith on Saturday, Santa Cruz police arrested him in the McDonald’s parking lot on Mission Street "without incident," said CHP spokesman Sam Courtney.
Smith claimed he had been on his way to turn himself in, according to Courtney.
Smith, who CHP officers say is homeless and known to stay at the River Street Shelter, was booked into County Jail on two counts of auto theft, malicious mischief, vandalism, possessing stolen property and driving on a suspended license.