COLONIE — A 20-year-old Schenectady man was arrested on Monday, Dec. 23, after leading police on a two-hour chase through three municipalities and in the process hitting five vehicles and three patrol cars and injuring two civilians and a police officer.
Lt. Robert Winn said pedestrians spotted Tyrone Taylor wearing a mask and opening car doors in the Colonie Center parking lot at around 3:35 p.m. According to the Department of Corrections and Community Services, Taylor was released on parole from state prison where he was serving time since 2017 for robbery and grand theft auto.
When police arrived, they spotted him get in a grey Chevrolet S-10 pickup truck and drive away. The truck had been reported stolen to Rotterdam police on Dec. 21.
Winn said Taylor ignored lights and sirens and sped off heading west on Central Avenue.
He hit four vehicles on Central Avenue between Colonie Center and Vly Road, causing minor damage and no injuries. He picked up speed and became more reckless so officers called off the pursuit.
They did, though, maintain visual contact and caught up to him, stopped in traffic, at Albany Street and Gifford Road, where he hit the marked patrol car and headed into Schenectady.
Colonie police lost him in the area of McClellan Street and Brandywine Avenue.
Schenectady police spotted him and kept visual contact until Taylor’s driving became again too reckless to continue the pursuit and they lost him on I-90 near the Guilderland rest area at about 4:25 p.m.
Albany police spotted him on Central Avenue at about 5:36 p.m. but also had to terminate their pursuit because of his reckless driving, according to Winn.
Colonie police, though, saw him cross the border back into town and caught up to the truck at the intersection of Central Avenue and Fuller Road where he allegedly hit two more Colonie patrol cars and a civilian vehicle before driving off the road and hitting a utility pole.
Taylor tried to flee on foot, Winn said, and did resist arrest but was taken into custody at 5:45 p.m.
Two civilians and one Colonie police officer suffered minor injuries and were taken to Memorial and St. Peter’s hospitals for treatment.
Taylor faces 16 charges, the most serious of which are the felonies of possession of stolen property and criminal mischief. Others include the misdemeanors of unlawfully fleeing a police officer, reckless endangerment, resisting arrest, reckless driving, aggravated unlicensed operation of a motor vehicle and a host of traffic infractions.
He may also face charges in Schenectady and Albany, Winn said, and will likely face state parole violations.
