A parking lot rampage
A Vermont man apparently has serious anger control issues. Officials say the man got so angry at police that he drove his tractor into a sheriff’s department parking lot and proceeded to play Demolition Derby — demolishing seven police cruisers, according to The Associated Press (AP).
The attack in Newport, Vt., last Friday left Orleans County sheriff’s deputies afoot, literally. They had to borrow a civilian vehicle to go after the guy.
But the attacker, a 34-year-old man angry over a recent arrest for resisting arrest and marijuana possession, wasn’t finished. When two Newport police officers started chasing the man in their city vehicle, he suddenly started backing the tractor toward them.
“I backed up in fear of our safety about 10 to 15 feet before bumping into another vehicle,” a Newport officer wrote in his report, according to AP. The officer and his partner then fled their car to avoid getting run over.
Finally, officers surrounded the tractor-fiend and ordered him out at gunpoint. Officials said he was carrying a loaded pistol. The man was arrested and now faces several felony charges.
No one was injured in the incident, but the sheriff’s department cruisers were put out of action. Deputies tried to salvage what they could, using tools usually used to extract crash victims to pry open their cruisers’ trunks. Other sheriffs’ departments, meanwhile, said they would loan cruisers to Orleans County.