When a state trooper pulled up on a accident Monday morning, the last thing he may have expected was that someone would steal his patrol cruiser.
A Highway Patrol spokesman said the incident began with a three-car accident on Wade Hampton Boulevard at Reid School Road just after 6:30 a.m. A trooper arrived on the scene to investigate the accident.
Lance Cpl. Dan Marsceau said that while the trooper was talking with the people involved in the accident, one of them, Carrie Lamb, jumped into the trooper's cruiser and drove off down Wade Hampton toward Greenville.
A Greer police officer kept her in sight until she got onto Edwards Road. Another trooper found her at the intersection of East North Street and Haywood Road.The trooper pursued Lamb along Haywood Road to Interstate 385, where she sideswiped a minivan and drove off the on-ramp to southbound I-385 into a grassy area, flattening both left-side tires.
Marsceau said Lamb attempted to jump out of the cruiser at that point, but the pursuing cruiser smashed the door as she opened it, and she was taken into custody.
Lamb, 20, faces charges of failure to stop for a police vehicle, grand larceny auto, possession of a controlled substance, failure to have driver's liscense in possession and failure to wear a seat belt.
Troopers could not say why Lamb took the cruiser, but witnesses said she ran a red light at Wade Hampton Boulevard and Reid School Road, causing the initial accident.