BUFFALO, N.Y. — The one witness Erie County District Attorney John Flynn wants to hear from about Thursday’s police chase through the streets of the Buffalo is the officer now in the hospital because of that chase.
At last report, Officer Jonathan Negron was in the trauma intensive care unit at Erie County Medical Center with serious head injuries.
The injuries happened at the end of the brief chase. An SUV with four males inside drove through Mount Calvary Cemetery, exiting the northeast corner of the property to Harlem Avenue.
As the SUV entered the street, it hit two vehicles and snapped a light pole.
Flynn said, “Officer Negron was following at least a car length or two behind the car, and the pole happened to fall as the car’s coming at the same time.”
A section of the light pole crashed through the driver’s side window on the police cruiser Negron was driving.
The District Attorney says all four occupants of the SUV fled on foot. Police apprehended all of them. Only the driver, a 16-year-old male from Rochester, was charged.
Because of his age, the name of the 16-year-old was not released. He is currently being held without bail in the Erie County Youth Detention facility, charged with Assault on a Police Officer and Unlawful Fleeing a Police Officer in a Motor Vehicle. Both counts are felonies.
The entire case originated with a 911 call. Flynn says a woman reported a light colored SUV that had four males in it, wearing masks, and there was a gun. Negron was nearby and spotting an SUV seemingly matching the description, and Flynn says the SUV took off, beginning the chase.
The District Attorney says since the crash, investigators have been told there was possibly more than one firearm inside the SUV. But a search of the vehicle, the cemetery, and the chase route has not turned up any weapons.
Flynn says Negron would potentially be a key witness if they were able to interview him.
“The only person who had a clear view of the vehicle in front of them, who may have saw them throw something out a window, is in a medically induced coma right now. We can’t talk to him,” Flynn said.