Second person in three days dies during Vallejo police pursuit

VALLEJO – A suspect driving an allegedly stolen vehicle crashed while fleeing Vallejo police on Monday night and died after the car caught fire, according to witnesses and police dispatch audio.

The unidentified suspect was the second person killed during a Vallejo police pursuit in three days. Earlier this year, Vallejo police said they were seeking to reduce crashes and injuries during pursuits.

According to dispatch audio, Monday’s pursuit started just before 11 p.m. after an officer saw a white Dodge that was reported stolen driving north on Couch Street.

The officer followed the car and then attempted to pull it over, but the driver failed to yield and then fled south on Broadway at up to 60 mph, according to dispatch audio.

T. Jones, who lives on Tennessee Street, said she heard police sirens and saw police pursuing a white SUV at Broadway and Tennessee.

The vehicle crashed into a house on the southeast corner of Broadway and Alabama Street and caught fire. Jones said she could see smoke coming from the hood of the vehicle.

Dispatch audio indicates that officers used a 40 mm less-lethal round to break the window and extricate the occupant, who was trapped inside. Emergency personnel then performed CPR on the driver, but he died a short time later.

Jones said there was a pool of blood on the pavement that fire crews later washed off the street with the fire hoses they had used to put out the vehicle fire. Police and emergency crews covered the body of the occupant with a yellow tarp.

Vallejo police did not respond to a request for more information on Tuesday morning.

The fatal crash follows another death during a Vallejo police pursuit early Saturday morning. During that pursuit, one person in a car fleeing Vallejo police was killed and five other people were injured, including two bystanders.

That pursuit started when Vallejo police officers attempted to pull over a dark gray Mercedes near Sonoma Boulevard and Lemon Street just before 1 a.m. Saturday, according to a police press release.

When the Mercedes did not stop, an officer pursued the vehicle north on Sonoma Boulevard and reported that the vehicle was traveling at 75 miles per hour. It collided with a blue Subaru at the intersection of Sonoma and Tennessee, according to dispatch communications.

Police said that officers and the Vallejo Fire Department provided medical aid to the occupants of both vehicles but one person in the Mercedes was pronounced dead at the scene. Emergency vehicles transported the two occupants of the Subaru and three other occupants from the Mercedes to local hospitals, according to dispatch communications.

Officers found four firearms in the Mercedes, according to police dispatch audio, and a witness said that one of the occupants was wearing a ski mask.

The latest fatal crashes come as the Vallejo Police Department is seeking to reduce the number of crashes related to police pursuits after an internal report found that the number of pursuits have dramatically increased since 2020. Two bystanders were killed in pursuits involving Vallejo police last year.

Deaths and serious injuries related to police pursuits have raised concerns among Vallejo community members about the safety of drivers and bystanders during high speed chases. 

Hudson Joseph Stanley was killed after a driver fleeing police at speeds reaching 90 miles per hour hit his pick-up truck causing it to flip over on Springs Road in August 2023. 

A month and a half later a 76-year-old man died from his injuries after being crushed between two vehicles when a vehicle involved in a high speed chase crashed into two parked cars on Carolina Street.

The Vallejo police report recommended that supervisors consider factors that have a higher likelihood of resulting in a crash in their decision to continue a pursuit, such as incidents at night, on weekends and when a driver is speeding or driving erratically.

A recent investigation by the San Francisco Chronicle found that pursuits have risen nationally since 2020. At least 3,336 people were killed in police vehicle pursuits from 2017 through 2022, including at least 1,377 people in 2020 and 2021. At least 551 of the people who died, or 27%, were bystanders, the Chronicle found.

In September 2023, the Police Executive Research Forum and the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Community Oriented Policing Services published a report on pursuits that recommended agencies take on more restrictive policies.

According to the report, a study of 56 agencies between 2001 and 2007 found that 23.5% of pursuits had some kind of negative outcome, such as accidents involving an injury or property damage; 9% of pursuits caused an injury to an officer, bystander or suspect.

“These data suggest that engaging in a pursuit may not always be worth the risks, particularly when a pursuit is not necessary to apprehend a suspect,” the report stated. “Rather than assuming the risks of a pursuit, for example, an officer might collect vehicle license plate information to apprehend the suspect later.”