After an intense chase on Route 11 that included several gunshots and an attempted escape into the bush, the Chaco police arrested four members of a gang that specialized in stealing vehicles in the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area and transporting them to Formosa for resale. Those involved are natives of that northeastern province.
The episode began when the drivers bypassed a police checkpoint at one of the entrances to Resistencia, the capital of Chaco. According to Diario Chaco, authorities had been warned that the criminals would pass through that point of the city, and given the attitude they took, the operation was deployed.
"We had information that they were going to pass through the area. The Rural Police were the ones handling that information and, based on that, they detected the passage of two vehicles: a white bodied Toyota pickup truck and a black double-cab Toyota," said the head of the provincial security force, Fernando Romero, to that same media outlet.
The information they had indicated that the gang in question "specializes in this method of bringing vehicles stolen in the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires or the province of Buenos Aires, destined for Formosa" to then "sell them to drug traffickers and smugglers."
The two Toyota trucks — a white SW4 and a black Hilux — did not stop at the police order at the vehicle checkpoint. The patrol cars immediately began to pursue them. The sequence was filmed by a person traveling in a car unrelated to the situation who happened to be passing by.
The police chief explained that the occupants of the white Toyota noticed the police presence, turned back before reaching the checkpoint and managed to escape, abandoning the truck at the scene. Meanwhile, the black truck managed to evade the checkpoint but was later stopped.
The footage shows the moment when, near kilometer 1046 of the highway, officers began firing from the windows of the patrol cars at the tires of the black truck, managing to destabilize it. The vehicle spun out and veered onto the shoulder. At that point, they managed to apprehend two men aged 27 and 59 who were inside.
Later during the day, two other individuals were arrested who had been traveling in a Volkswagen Vento that they had abandoned at kilometer 1041 of Route 11. Romero specified that they were "two Formosa natives who, upon noticing the police checkpoint, fled and were detained at the location where the black Toyota truck was seized."
He also stated that both trucks had bloodstains that were likely the result of "a violent robbery."
Prosecutor Lilian Irala is handling the case and may charge the suspects with the crimes of "resisting and assaulting authority, damage to state property, and concealment in connection with the robberies that occurred in the province of Buenos Aires."
