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WEST JORDAN — Two teenagers accused of stealing a pickup truck and later trying to flee from police by running across the Copper Hills High School football field were arrested in the bleachers Monday.
A Dodge pickup with the keys still in the vehicle was stolen about 5 a.m. by a 17-year-old boy and 16-year-old girl, said West Jordan Police Sgt. Dan Roberts.
A few blocks away, near 8600 South and 6200 West, the teens "took a corner way too fast, went up over the curb of one lawn, across a driveway, and right into a landscape feature of a house. They had some flowers and some boulders and just made a huge mess of it," he said.
The truck was able to drive away. Detectives looked at surveillance video from a neighbor's house and determined it was the stolen pickup that had crashed into the yard, Roberts said.
A few hours later, about 9 a.m., while responding to another call, a West Jordan officer spotted the stolen pickup and followed it into the parking lot at Copper Hills High School, 5445 New Bingham Highway, Roberts said.
Initially the officer thought the pickup was going to pull over. Instead, Roberts said it took off across the parking lot. Because of the potential for other students being hurt, the officer did not pursue, he said.
But moments later, the truck crashed through a fence near the football field and slid down the hill. "Then there's a short pursuit across the football field," Roberts said.
Backup officers arrived a short time later and arrested the boy and the girl, who is a Copper Hills High student, as they tried to hide in the bleachers, he said.
