Officials said Wednesday that a 41-year-old woman who hit a police cruiser and led police on a high-speed chase earlier this month that ended with a head-on crash on the 405 Motorway could spend more than 20 years in state jail.
Around 4:30 a.m. on May 17, officials from the Los Angeles Police Department were called to a report of a disturbance and were deliberately hit by a woman driving a van.
The suspect, who has since been named Lisa Ann Heflin, ran away right away, which is why police started a chase at 4:49 a.m. with assault with a deadly weapon.
Sky5 took pictures of the scene from above and showed the 41-year-old trying to hit several other police cars and then yelling at police officers from the window. At one point, Heflin turned the van around and drove after a police car down a street, running into it.
Police tried several pit manoeuvres on the 405 Motorway going north, but none of them worked.
After that, Heflin went off the motorway in the wrong direction and hit another car head-on. She kept going and hit a big rig and another car that was stopped on the motorway at full speed.
The accident happened near Sunset Boulevard in the Brentwood area. At least one car was badly damaged, and the van finally lost its power.
Heflin got out of the van with blood on her face, climbed on top of a big rig, and sat on the hood until police arrived and arrested her.
During the chase, five police cars, two civilian cars, and a tractor-trailer were destroyed.
“I am thankful that the civilians and police officers involved in this careless incident were not seriously hurt,” L.A. County District Attorney Gascón said in a news release about Heflin’s charges. “Driving carelessly and putting other people in danger is completely unacceptable and will not be accepted in our community.”
Heflin is accused of 10 counts of assaulting a police officer, 4 counts of attack with a deadly weapon, 1 count of fleeing a police officer’s car while driving recklessly, and 1 count of hit-and-run driving causing property damage.
She said she wasn’t guilty of all the charges against her at her court hearing on Wednesday. The amount of her bail was set at $695,000.
Heflin could spend 22 years and 8 months in jail if found guilty as charged.
