Opinion ID: 1890965
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The search for the robbers

Text: At 9:08 p.m. on February 25, Officer Christopher Myhand received a broadcast lookout about a carjacking. The lookout reported that the car was a black Mazda MX-6 with license number AB-2884, occupied by two men with handguns. Within minutes of the broadcast, Officer Myhand, traveling eastbound on Florida Avenue, N.W., spotted in his rear view mirror a car matching this description as it attempted to make an illegal U-turn. Keeping an eye on the car, Officer Myhand asked the dispatcher to repeat the license number, and when the dispatcher complied, the officer saw that it matched the tags on the Mazda. Officer Myhand quickly made a U-turn and started to follow the Mazda. When the two occupants of the Mazda realized that a police car was pursuing them, they stopped the car, jumped out, and ran into an alley. The officer, although he was moving fast, lost sight of the two men as he came within thirty to fifty feet of the Mazda. About ten to fifteen seconds later, as he drove past an alley that ran southbound from Florida Avenue in the middle of the 1200 block, Officer Myhand caught sight of the same two individuals running side by side down the alley. He activated his car's emergency lights and sped down 13th Street, which was parallel to the alley in which the men were running. He then turned into a connecting alley and saw the two suspects, still running side by side. As he closed the gap from behind, he saw that one of the men was wearing a dark jacket and blue jeans and that the other was dressed in all gray. Officer Myhand also saw a dark cloth object fall to the ground between the two men, who were still running side by side. The two men ran across 12th Place and into another alley, then turned north into a third alley heading back toward Florida Avenue. Upon reaching the spot where the men turned, Officer Myhand got out of his car and began to pursue them on foot. Peering around the corner of a building, he saw the man clad in gray trying to remove the upper part of his garment as he ran, but he lost sight of the other man. The officer broadcast a lookout, stating that one of the suspects  the man in gray  had turned east upon reaching Florida Avenue. Within seconds, Myhand heard a broadcast stating that the man had been apprehended on Florida Avenue. When he arrived at Florida, Officer Myhand saw appellant Baham in the custody of other officers standing next to a police car and recognized him as the man he had been chasing because he had a gray jump suit down around his ankles. [3] With Baham now in custody, Officer Myhand broadcast a lookout for the other suspect. Almost immediately thereafter, appellant Beaner emerged from the back yard of a house adjacent to the alley. Myhand recognized Beaner, on the basis of his clothing, as the other man he had been chasing and ordered him to the ground. He also noticed that Beaner was wearing Air Jordan shoes. [4] Unprompted by any questioning, Beaner declared that he just came out of his bitch's house. The entire chase lasted approximately one minute. Once both suspects were apprehended, Officer Myhand went back to the place where he saw the dark cloth object fall and learned from another officer on the scene that it was a black knit ski mask. He also requested that K-9 officers sweep the alley. No one else was found, however, and Officer Myhand did not recall seeing anyone in the alley area during the chase. Myhand also spoke with Shawn Davis, from whose back yard Beaner had emerged. Mr. Davis told Officer Myhand that he had been at home with his family that evening, that he had no visitors, that the back door was bolted and never used, and that he knew no one by the name of Kenneth Beaner. He also explained that, because his home was a row house, the back door was the only way to get directly from the house into the back yard. Officer Martin Fosso, a crime scene search technician, arrived at the scene and spoke to officers who had found a stocking mask in the east side alley off of 12th Place, as well as another ski mask just over a fence in a nearby yard at 1221 W Street, N.W. From the black Mazda, Officer Fosso recovered an operable nine-millimeter Ruger pistol, as well as a silk-looking scarf that Ms. Bonney identified at trial as hers.