MIAMI — A 42-year-old Miami man who laughed and fled a traffic stop in Miami’s Allapattah neighborhood did not get very far, according to police.
The accused driver, Eduardo Barbaro Gonzalez, wasn’t smiling as he posed for a mugshot from a hospital stretcher while being booked into the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center over the weekend on a host of criminal charges and probation warrants.
According to an arrest report from the Miami Police Department, the incident happened at around 11 p.m. on Wednesday.
Police said a uniformed officer working a crime suppression detail in an area known for “high narcotics sales and usage” saw Gonzalez, of Flagami, parked in a small shopping center at 2280 NW 28th St. and engaged in what appeared to be a hand-to-hand drug deal from a Dodge Charger.
Authorities said Gonzalez saw the officer’s marked squad car and threw his Dodge into reverse in an attempt to leave the lot.
“I moved my vehicle in front of (Gonzalez’s) vehicle and lowered my window to talk to him,” the officer wrote in the report.
It states that Gonzalez lowered his window and asked the cop, “Are you trying to come in?”
“No, I need to speak to you,” the officer said, according to the report. “You aren’t free to leave.”
Police said Gonzalez then “laughed out loud” and said “Hahaha, sike” as he hit the gas and sped off with his tires smoking.
He would soon run a stop sign at Northwest 23rd Avenue and 23rd Street and crash into an 18-wheeler, police said. Another officer happened to be behind the truck.
Police said Gonzalez jumped out of his car after the wreck, but was hobbled by a leg injury and police took him into custody.
According to the report, medics took him to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where he gave officers a fake name and date of birth.
However, the truth about his identity came out when another officer brought a fingerprint reader to the hospital, police said. They said he had eight active warrants and an open case with the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office for fleeing and eluding.
He would later be booked into jail on Friday on multiple fleeing and eluding and resisting arrest charges, along with a series of probation warrants for charges including aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, cocaine possession and grand theft.
He remained held in TGK as of Monday.
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