KOTA KINABALU: Police had to fire several shots at a car whose driver tried to ram into their vehicle during a brief high-speed chase at a busy intersection here today.
There were five suspects in the car but it wasn’t entirely clear why they were fleeing from the police although it is believed to be because they either had no valid personal documents or were in illegal possession of someone else’s MyKad.
The incident started at 10.30am when police received a call about a couple supposedly in a heated argument in Tanjung Aru town, some 5km from the city centre.
City police chief Mohd Zaidi Abdullah said a patrol team that responded to the call found a car that had five people in it, including a woman, aged between 20 and 34. The police then told the group to disembark from the vehicle.
He said the couple then handed their MyKad to the police for a check.
Two of the other three men with them told police they did not bring their documents with them while the last suspect, the driver, claimed his MyKad was at the driver’s seat and went to retrieve it.
However, two other suspects, including the woman, quickly followed the driver and got into the car before driving off, leaving their accomplices, including the woman’s husband, behind.
A high-speed chase then ensued, with police tailing the car to the busy Jalan Tun Fuad Stephens in the city centre.
At one of the intersections there, Zaidi said the car stopped before trying to reverse dangerously, almost hitting the police car in pursuit.
“This forced police to open fire at the tyres of the car,” he said. “The car finally came to a halt in the middle of the busy road before the trio abandoned it and fled on foot.”
Some members of the public managed to record the incident on video, which has since been widely shared on social media.
According to Zaidi, police eventually tracked down the woman to a lodging house at the nearby Sinsuran area. They found her to be in illegal possession of another person’s MyKad.
He added efforts were under way to locate the two other suspects who have only been identified as Ijam and Ali.-FMT