Red-Faced Police Officer Loses His Black and White

A youth who was stopped by police on Friday for running a red light made an unusual getaway.

He drove off in the patrol car of the officer who had pulled him over.

“The officer saw his car leave, and there really wasn’t much that he could do about it,” Santa Ana Police spokeswoman Maureen Haacker said, declining to identify the officer.

The incident began about 8 a.m. Friday when the officer pulled the teen-ager over for running a red light at the intersection of Shelton and Cubbon streets. The officer couldn’t find any identification on the young driver, so he ordered him into the back seat of the patrol car.

While the officer was looking for identification inside the teen-ager’s car, the detainee crawled through a plexiglass window in the divider that separates the front from the back seat and drove off.

“Whether he slid the (window) open or it was opened already, we’re not sure,” Haacker said. “But he climbed into the driver seat and left the scene in the officer’s car.

About 10 minutes later, a woman called police after becoming concerned about seeing a “young boy” driving a patrol car, Haacker said. Officers found the car abandoned at 400 W. Cubbon St., about a mile from where the initial stop took place. The youth escaped.

Haacker said the car the teen-ager was driving before he was stopped had not been reported stolen. Police hope to locate him through additional investigation.

The fugitive is described as being between 16 and 18, 5-foot-4 and 130 pounds.