Two kids dead after crash; police chase sparked by false plates

EVANSVILLE, Ind. — A chase that left a 7-month-old and 2-year-old dead and their father with life-threatening injuries started after police tried to stop a car over false plates.

Police say Frederick O. McFarland, 26, fled from police Wednesday night after driving away from a traffic stop at the 700 block of Bayard Park Drive.

More: Two children dead after police chase ends in crash on South Side

The car chase ended a half-mile away at Linwood and Monroe avenues on the South Side after McFarland crashed a 2017 Impala into a 2003 PT Cruiser carrying two adults and their two children.

Officers patrolling the Jacobsville neighborhood had checked the Impala’s plate and reported the license plates belonged to another car, Evansville Police spokesman Sgt. Jason Cullum said Thursday. They lost sight of the Impala but found it again near Bayard Park Drive and Evans Avenue. McFarland and a passenger had left the car with the lights on, which police believed was suspicious, so an officer approached to check the VIN and see if it was reported stolen.

The driver and passenger got back into the Impala and the officer activated his lights, but the Impala allegedly drove off while the officer was walking up to the car to talk to the driver. That passenger is still on the run.

There were no reports the car was stolen as of Thursday afternoon, Cullum said.

Under Indiana law, attaching license plates to the wrong car starts as a misdemeanor but can be a low-level felony depending on the market value of the vehicle and plates.

The EPD officer gave chase and another police car eventually joined the pursuit. The crash ended the chase and sent McFarland, 23-year-old Janae Carter, 26-year-old Terrence Barker and 2-year-old Princess Carter to the hospital. Seven-month-old Prince Carter was ejected from the car and pronounced dead on-scene.

'MY BABY, MY BABY'

Tanieshia Givens, 19, recently moved into the home at the corner of Linwood and Monroe, across the street from the crash. She heard a loud boom Wednesday night then went outside. She saw the PT Cruiser mangled around a tree at the corner. McFarland's car stopped about 250 feet east on Monroe Avenue.

"I seen the cops come from right here (Linwood north of Monroe) to the car, jump out their car, pulled the guns. When they did, the cops told the other cops to go to the other car (McFarland's), but the lady kept crying. She kept saying 'my baby, my baby,'" Givens said.

The Courier & Press viewed a video Givens captured moments after the crash. The car hit the tree. An officer has his gun drawn walking toward the driver's side door.

"Show me your hands," the officer says in the video. His command is immediately followed by a woman wailing. It's not clear who is wailing. Cullum said the officer mistook the PT Cruiser for the fleeing Impala after the crash.

Cullum disputed the Givens' eyewitness account. Citing body-cam footage the Courier & Press has not reviewed, Cullum said there was an 8-minute gap between the officers drawing their weapons at Carter at the crash scene and her calling out "my baby, my baby."

Cullum said the body-cam footage shows the officers making the commands to "show your hands" but there was no immediate response from Carter or Barker because everyone in the car was unconscious when police arrived.

The Courier & Press requested the body-cam footage Thursday morning. Cullum said the department would respond to the Courier's and other outlets' request for video Friday.

Thursday morning, a pair of flowers stood by the torn bark of the tree where the crash occurred. The memorial grew throughout the day.

"These babies shouldn’t be remembered like this," said Taylor Rustin, a friend of Janae Carter. "I’ve got babies of my own, and I just could not imagine. I could not imagine."

Janae loved the children, she said, repeating it.

"And it’s like, God didn’t take one, he took them both. ... I don’t understand," Rustin said. "A mother shouldn’t have to bury her babies right before the holidays."

Cullum began a news conference Thursday afternoon by offering condolences to the children's family on behalf of the Evansville Police Department.

"Life’s too short," Rustin said. "Everything can be taken away in the blink of an eye."

POLICE CHASE PROTOCOL

Pursuits that involve an EPD officer are automatically reviewed by the department, Cullum said. The investigation of this chase is not finished, but EPD officials say the initial pursuit did not break department guidelines.

He estimated EPD is involved in an average of 60 pursuits per year, just more than one per week. The last EPD pursuit to end in a fatal crash was the afternoon of Sept. 14, 2009. Details were not available on how many pursuits since then ended in a crash that caused injury but not death.

“We don’t always know why people are running,” Cullum said. “Sometimes it’s for very minor offenses, sometimes it’s for something they may have just done that we don’t know about, that are acts of violence. It’s a constant weighing of information.”

Chases are monitored by an on-duty supervisor, and anyone in the department can call off a pursuit if they believe it is too dangerous, Cullum said. Some communities have considered policies to ban all pursuits because they are dangerous to officers, passersby and suspects.

“The concern for that is you’re giving the green flag to anybody that just decides they’re not going to stop,” Cullum said.

In the fatal 2009 collision, just like in Wednesday’s crash, a passing driver who was not involved in the pursuit was hit by the suspect vehicle. Kyle Parker, 29, died in the hospital shortly after the collision in front of Stringtown Branch Library at Herndon Drive and Stringtown Road.

In that case, police were pursuing an 18-year-old they said was speeding, driving 30 mph in Garvin Park, and driving recklessly. He was later convicted of resisting law enforcement as a class B felony and operating a vehicle under the influence of a controlled substance, causing death, a class C felony.

It’s not clear yet if the two children in the PT Cruiser were properly restrained, Cullum said, but that is also under investigation. Princess was inside the car in a car seat when officers arrived, while Prince was outside the car.

THREE PEOPLE HOSPITALIZED

Terrence Baker was still in the hospital with life-threatening injuries as of Thursday afternoon. Janae Carter was also hospitalized with serious injuries that did not appear life-threatening as of Thursday.

McFarland was in the hospital Thursday under police guard. Formal charges had not been filed yet.

He had no active warrants at the time of the chase, according to court records. McFarland did have a pending Vanderburgh County case where he was charged with dealing marijuana and carrying a handgun without a license as level 5 felonies.

McFarland will be charged in the crash and pursuit when he is released from the hospital, Cullum said.

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