A Louisiana woman is in custody at the Chaffee County Detention Facility following her arrest Monday after leading sheriff’s deputies and a state trooper on a pursuit that reached a speed of one hundred miles per hour.

Just before 2:30pm Tuesday, Deputy Rod Lane was conducting radar speed enforcement north of Poncha Springs when he observed a sedan southbound on US 285 at a speed registering 81 mph on the deputy’s radar in a posted 35mph zone.  Activating his emergency lights, Deputy Lane finally caught up with the car a few miles below the summit of Poncha Pass and the vehicle came to a stop in the southbound traffic lane.  When the deputy instructed the driver, alone in the vehicle, to pull her car onto the shoulder out of traffic, she directed a line of obscenities at the officer and drove off, making a U-turn on the highway and driving north with the deputy following.

After driving a short distance north on US 285 toward Poncha Springs, the woman driver again made a U-turn and began once again driving south toward Poncha Pass summit at a high rate of speed as the deputy pursued with his emergency lights and siren operating. 

The woman’s vehicle reached a speed of 100 mph as monitored by Deputy Lane.  The deputy informed our communications center that he was in pursuit and that the woman’s car had begun to swerve into the oncoming traffic lane.  Saguache County deputies and the state patrol were alerted to the situation as the pursuit entered Saguache County.

Monitoring the pursuit by radio, Undersheriff Spezze verified that all violations were solely traffic in nature.  Determining that the danger to other motorists posed by continuing the pursuit was not justified, the undersheriff directed Deputy Lane to terminate the pursuit.

A short time later Saguache County deputies informed their counterparts in Chaffee County that they had the driver in custody.  According to Saguache County deputies they encountered the vehicle travelling south on US 285 and attempted to stop it. The driver made a U-turn on the highway and again sped off.  Eventually a state trooper deployed stop sticks in the highway which disabled the vehicle and the woman was taken into custody.

The woman, Theresa M. Carter, 53, resident of Bourg, Louisiana, was lodged at Chaffee County Detention Center charged with felony eluding and speeding.  Her bond was set at $15,000.