From Press, Staff Reports

A high-speed chase earlier this month on the Natchez Trace Parkway ended at Mathiston with the suspects' car flipping out of control near two local lawmen and felony charges filed against the two fleeing teens.

The 10-minute chase at speeds exceeding 100 mph across three counties and dramatic crash were captured on the dashboard-mounted video camera in a pursuing officer's patrol car. Besides the crash, the footage shows some near misses between the suspects' car and other motorists. The teen-agers, whom authorities say were suspected of being high on methamphetamine, were the only ones injured during the pursuit.

This account of the 22-mile pursuit on June 13 is based upon interviews with law enforcement officers involved, viewing of the video footage at the Webster County Sheriff's Department and published reports:

The ordeal was triggered around 6 p.m. when a Houston store contacted the Chickasaw County Sheriff's Department after two males, later identified as Jeremy R. Green and Charles Hart, attempted to purchase a large amount of cold medicine containing pseudoephedrine - an ingredient that can be used to make crystal methamphetamine. They were denied the purchase because they had no identification.

Local authorities were given a description of the vehicle, a Geo Prism with Choctaw County plates, and Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics agent Brian Ely spotted the car on the Trace headed southbound. Chickasaw County Deputy Sheriff Adam Harmon, who was already on the Trace a few miles ahead of the car, was informed of this and set up a checkpoint at an intersection with the parkway near milepost 226.

As the car approached Harmon while he was standing in the middle of the road attempting to flag it down, the driver "gunned it" and darted toward him, who had to jump out of the way behind his patrol car.

"They tried to run me down," Harmon said. "I got in my vehicle and began pursuit."

He was followed closely in a car driven by Ely.

As Green, the driver of the Geo, and Hart traveled down the Trace, darting in and out of traffic that Monday evening, Harmon followed and captured amazing images with the video camera mounted on the dashboard of his patrol car. The camera was purchased less than one year ago through a Homeland Security Grant.

Green's erratic and reckless driving forced motorists on the parkway to maneuver to avoid colliding with him.

"They ran three or four vehicles off the road," Harmon said. "Fortunately, traffic was relatively light and no one was hurt."

Harmon said the teens threw items (that were later determined to be drugs and drug paraphernalia) from the vehicle as they fled on the Trace.

OFFICERS ASSIST

Meanwhile, Natchez Trace rangers and other deputies had been asked to assist. Mathiston Police Chief Roger Miller and Webster County Sheriff Calvin Robinson parked their patrol cars just north of the Trace's Highway 82 exit at Mathiston on the northbound side.

As Green and Hart approached, Robinson was behind his patrol car trying to deploy a spike strip in the road to blow out the vehicle's tires and Miller was in his vehicle watching for the Geo.

Robinson said Miller saw the car and told him it was too close to set the spike strip out. When the car neared them at 6:23 p.m., the vehicle darted off the east side of the road onto the shoulder, cleared the exit road and hit nose-first in the island. The car then went airborne, rolling end over end at least four or five times before coming to rest in the wooded area on the westbound side of the Trace.

"I saw them put their seatbelts on just before crashing," Harmon said. "Had they not been wearing seatbelts, they would have likely been killed."

Fortunately, Robinson nor Miller were hit by the car. Robinson, who can be seen in the video footage moving out of the way as the Geo approached, said, "I had nowhere to go. ... I couldn't run too far."

Harmon praised the local officers for their assistance. "If not for them ... it's no telling how far (Green and Hart) would have gotten," he said.

Harmon said when he approached the occupants while they were still in the car, 'They were fixing to try to run," and he had to use a stun gun on one of them.

An ambulance from North Mississippi Medical Center-Eupora transported Green and Hart to NMMC in Tupelo. Harmon said they suffered minor injuries and were released four or five hours later to the custody of Chickasaw County.

Charges against Green, 19, of 2194 Craig Springs Road, Sturgis, include aggravated assault with a motor vehicle on a law enforcement officer, felony fleeing (which was a misdemeanor charge until last year), conspiracy to manufacture meth, possession of precursors and other traffic violations.

Hart, 17, of Route 3, Box 15, Ackerman, was charged with conspiracy to manufacture meth and possession of precursors. They are being held in the Chickasaw County Jail in Okolona (Second Judicial District), with Green's bond set at $150,000 and Hart's at $80,000. They are scheduled to have a preliminary hearing on July 21.

Harmon said the video shot from his patrol car will be provided to "In the Line of Duty," a company that provides training material for law enforcement officers, to show the effects that meth has on youth.

Mississippi's new methamphetamine law takes effect Friday. It restricts where cold medicines containing pseudoephedrine or ephedrine may be displayed, restrictions on the quantities of such medicines that may be sold, and the requirement of photo identification for the purchase of these products.

PREVIOUS CHASE

The Oktibbeha County Sheriff's Department confirmed that Green was involved in another high-speed chase on Aug. 25, 2001, across two states.

That chase began when Green and another teen-ager, a female, passed Oktibbeha County Sheriff Dolph Bryan and Starkville Police Chief David Lindley on the wrong side of East Lee Boulevard on the Mississippi State campus in a "very careless manner" in a Chrysler Sebring, Lindley and Bryan said at the time. Police officials said the car was stolen by force from the female's father.

Initially intending to pull them over and give them a verbal warning, Bryan and Lindley began pursuing them after the two teens fled east to U.S. 82.

Bryan and Lindley radioed for backup, following the teens onto U.S. 45 South before they eventually turned onto a Kemper County road and headed into Alabama. When the two slowed down at an intersection of Highway 17 north of York, Ala., Lindley and Bryan were able to hit them from behind and force them to stop.

Green and the girl, as juveniles, were each charged and convicted of four counts of aggravated assault and numerous traffic offenses, including reckless driving, speeding in excess of 120 mph, running seven stop signs and one red light, improper passing and running police roadblocks, according to the Starkville Daily News.

During the pursuit, a couple from Montevallo, Ala., was traveling with a group of motorcyclists on U.S. 45 in Lowndes County when their motorcycle collided with a Starkville police car that was en route to provide backup. A Mississippi Highway Patrol cruiser and another car were also involved in the accident. In addition to the couple, the police officer was also injured.

Editor's Note: This article includes reporting by Mike Prince in the June 22 issue of The Times-Post of Houston, WPT News Editor Russell Hood and the Starkville Daily News, plus information from a June 22 posting on the National Park Service's online "NPS Digest."