CEDAR CITY — An Arizona driver who allegedly fled from police Sunday afternoon near Parowan was apprehended a short time later by officers who found the woman on the rooftop of a home in Enoch.
Samantha Flanagan, 28, of Camp Verde, Arizona, was arrested and booked into Iron County Jail on several charges, including fugitive from justice, failure to stop at command of police, reckless driving, speeding, theft of a rental vehicle and possession of drugs and paraphernalia.
According to the probable cause statement filed in support of her arrest, Flanagan had three extraditable warrants out of Arizona, at least one of which was a felony.
According to the charging document, the incident began shortly after 4:30 p.m. Sunday when a Parowan Police officer attempted to pull over the driver of a newer model Ford Mustang traveling on Interstate 15 without its lights on in inclement weather.
Instead of pulling over, the driver increased her speed and pulled away from the officer, at one point reaching an estimated speed of 115 mph, the officer wrote.
The woman reportedly exited I-15 at Exit 75 at Summit and continued south on Old Highway 91, at which point an Iron County Sheriff’s deputy deployed a spike strip across the roadway. Although the driver swerved to miss the spikes, they did deflate the vehicle’s tires on the passenger side, the statement said.
The driver didn’t stop right away, but the vehicle ultimately left the road and crashed through a barbed wire fence, at which point the driver exited the car and fled on foot.
Officers from multiple agencies set up a perimeter, after which the woman was found on the rooftop of a nearby residence and taken into custody.
Deputies reportedly found a substance suspected to be methamphetamine in the vehicle, along with glass paraphernalia with drug residue inside. They also found multiple credit cards that did not belong to the driver, the charging document adds. Additionally, the Ford Mustang was reported to have been stolen from a Hertz car rental establishment in Arizona.
Flanagan, who is being held in Iron County Jail, has not yet made her initial court appearance as of Tuesday morning.
This report is based on information provided by law enforcement and may not contain the full scope of findings. Persons arrested or charged are presumed innocent until found guilty in a court of law or as otherwise decided by a trier-of-fact.
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