A robbery suspects crime spree -- which includes threatening a 4-year-old with a gun -- came to an end last night after he crashed the stolen car he was driving into a wall and was shot by a Phoenix police officer.
According to the Phoenix Police Department, just before 10 p.m. yesterday, the suspect -- whose name has not been released -- and a woman pushed a man to the ground in the parking lot of a hotel on the Black Canyon Highway. The suspect then took the man's money and the keys to his black Mercedes SUV.
Less than an hour later, a woman was robbed at gunpoint at a gas station near 35th and Peoria avenues. The suspect put a gun in the woman's face and demanded money. He also pointed the gun at her 4-year-old child, who was seated in the car. She gave him all the cash she had and a credit card before the thief fled in the Mercedes SUV.
After stealing a car, cash, and threatening a baby, the suspect was on
the cops' radar. Shortly after the robbery at the gas station, the
stolen SUV was spotted by police near 35th and Glendale Avenues.
After police tried to pull him over, the suspect turned into a nearby
strip mall, and crashed the SUV into a wall. The woman in the car
immediately jumped out of the car and surrendered to police. The man,
however, pulled a gun on police -- and was promptly shot by one of the
responding officers.
Phoenix Sergeant Tommy Thompson says the suspect was shot in the "lower
extremities" and received non-life-threatening injuries. He was taken to
a Valley hospital and is expected to survive.
The officer who shot the suspect has been placed on administrative leave
as the shooting is investigated, as is standard procedure following an
officer who shoots someone.
