PINECREST, Fla. — Three Georgia men are facing charges in South Florida after police said they tried to burglarize a home belonging to “Real Housewives of Miami” star Larsa Pippen.
Pinecrest police arrested Treison Lachae Booker, 23, of Powder Springs, Georgia; Cortez Daymon Johnson, 23, of Atlanta; and Elijah Eugene Russell, 18, of Albany, Georgia, on Sunday, soon after the alleged break-in attempt.
Police said Pippen, the 51-year-old ex-wife of NBA legend Scottie Pippen, wasn’t home at the time, but watched the attempt on her surveillance video as police were dispatched to a burglar alarm report.
Authorities said the trio shattered the home’s windows but never got in.
Pinecrest police Chief Jason Cohen also responded after hearing the call go out. He said the three fled into a car and then crashed into another car and then a fence in the 9700 block of Southwest 57th Avenue. All three bailed out, police said. Cohen said he personally apprehended Russell.
“I spot (Russell) walking. He’s trying to walk away, out of the area. It’s just me and him. I get out of my car, I order him to the ground,” Cohen said. “I start running after him. He crosses Kendall Drive, into a house’s yard. He jumps the fence. I open the gate to the fence. I walk in. He then jumps into the back, which is the canal back there too, the Snapper Creek Canal. He jumps into the canal. When I get to the canal bank, he’s hanging on.”
Cohen said it was his first foot pursuit in 15 years.
“If he didn’t jump into the canal, he probably had me,” he said.
Cohen said investigators believe Pippen was likely targeted by the Peach State trio ― and they’re “working to confirm” that.
“They came from Georgia (and) it looks like they went straight to this house,“ he said. “So that’s the theory our detectives are going on.”
The three men are now facing charges, including attempted burglary. All three were being held in the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center on bonds ranging from $7,500 to $8,000.
Russell, additionally, has an arrest warrant out of Georgia, according to court proceedings.
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