Police release video of suspect hitting employee with stolen pickup at tow yard
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PORTLAND, OR (KPTV ) — Portland police are asking for the public’s help identifying the suspects who broke into a north Portland tow yard, stole a pickup and then ran over an employee while fleeing the scene.
On Wednesday, at around 2:38 a.m., officers responded to a hit-and-run at 21st Century Towing at 8510 North Kerby Avenue.
Surveillance video released Friday shows two suspects, a white man believed to be 60 to 70 years old and a white woman believed to be 20 to 30 years old, trying to break into the locked gate. When the suspects can’t break through the lock, the woman crawls under the gate into the tow yard.
Moments later, an employee shows up at the unlocked gate.
Surveillance video shows that while the employee is attempting to unlock it, the woman drives a pickup truck into the gate, knocking the employee to the ground. The employee gets up and begins banging on the drivers window while the woman continues to drive the truck into the gate.
The woman eventually drives off in the stolen pickup.
The employee was taken to an area hospital for treatment of injuries sustained. The employee’s father told FOX 12 that his son had a broken collar bone, among other injuries.
That employee, Josh Durrett, tolf FOX 12 on Friday that his adrenaline was pumping, so he didn’t realize just how bad things really were.
“I heard the engine rev up, then next thing I know I’m flying though the air,” Durrett told FOX 12.
With that adrenaline still pumping, Durrett was quickly back on his feet.
“I didn’t feel anything so yeah hopped right back up and immediately went after the person in the car, and I was trying to hopefully get that window open and pull them out, but yeah that didn’t work,” Durrett said with a laugh.
Durrett has a long list of wounds, but he said, “I’m just happy to be alive to be honest.”
The owner of 21st Century Towing is also grateful things weren’t worse.
“Forget everything else, there’s no amount of money to hurt an employee the way that she did. We all agree, if he wouldn’t have moved, she would have ran him over and it would have been very severe, maybe could have ended his life,” said Clark Tenney.
Police believe the suspects arrived in a white work van with lettering on the side.
The stolen pickup was a charcoal 2016 Ford F150. The pickup had a matching canopy with Oregon license plate 628JPG. Investigators believe the pickup will have substantial front end damage and no front license plate.
Anyone with information about the current location of the involved vehicles is asked to call 911 and reference case 20-48998.
WARNING: The surveillance video may be hard to watch: youtube.com/watch?v=x-ikwCpxK_s&feature=youtu.be
Anyone with information about the case is asked to contact Detective Nathan Moore at (503) 823-0693 or Nathan.moore@portlandoregon.gov or Detective Jeff Sharp at (503) 823-9773 or jeff.sharp@portlandoregon.gov.
A GoFundMe has been posted to support the employee. You can visit the GoFundMe here: gofundme.com/f/joshua039s-tragic-accident?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet
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