Driver in Custody After Leading Police on Chase in Dallas County

A driver led sheriff’s deputies and constables on a high-speed chase through Dallas County Monday afternoon before being taken into custody in a North Dallas neighborhood.

The chase originated with the Kaufman County Sheriff’s Office when deputies tried to stop the driver of a black Mercedes sedan for a traffic violation. The driver, whose vehicle had a paper license tag, refused to pull over.

The Texas DPS was called in for assistance at about 1:15 p.m.in Kaufman County before the chase moved into Dallas County.

The driver sped back and forth down interstates 30 and 635, spinning out once and hitting a concrete barrier wall after exiting Dalrock near Lake Ray Hubbard, but still refused to stop.

The driver went back toward Dallas and north on 635 toward Garland. It was there the driver exited Plano Road and drove to a neighborhood near the intersection with Forest Lane.

Moments later the driver bailed out and tried to escape on foot. At about 2:15 p.m., after jumping several fences and trying to hide in between homes and in alleyways, the visibly fatigued man was chased onto a parked car by a K-9 officer and then taken into custody by the dog’s partner.

Speeds in the chase were estimated to have exceeded 115 mph.

The vehicle’s registration status and the legitimacy of the paper tag on the vehicle are not yet known and it’s also not known why the driver refused to pull over.

GRAND PRAIRIE OFFICER DIES

A Grand Prairie police officer, Brandon Tsai, was memorialized Monday. Tsai died last week after crashing while pursuing a driver with a paper tag.

The driver of the vehicle Tsai was pursuing had a phony paper tag that officials said had been recorded on hundreds of vehicles.

PAPER TAGS INVESTIGATED

For more than a year NBC 5’s investigative team has been looking into the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles’ paper tag system and how criminals have been able to gain access to it and exploit it for millions of dollars in illicit gains.

Paper tags can be legitimate, but they can also be counterfeit if they were printed or copied and sold by a criminal abusing the state’s temporary tag system.

Last week, the Texas DPS announced they had redesigned the temporary tags being issued by dealers and that the new look would roll out next month. The new paper tags contain several security enhancements designed to prevent fraud.

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