- A Florida man walked out of jail, stole an SUV from the courthouse parking lot, and led police on a high-speed chase for the second time in under a week.
Some people get released from jail and try to keep a low profile. Authorities in Florida say a 23-year-old from Miami Gardens did the opposite, walking out of custody and almost immediately stealing a Ford SUV from the courthouse parking lot before leading officers on his second high-speed chase in less than a week. The whole thing reads like a man who learned nothing from getting caught the first time, because the second arrest looks a lot like the first.
Out the Door and Right Back Into Trouble
Jefry Julian Chaucanes Vasquez was released from the Monroe County jail on June 12, 2026. According to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office, he did not waste any time before getting into more trouble. Deputies say that right after walking out, he stole a Ford SUV from the Plantation Key Courthouse parking lot and took off, putting him back on the wrong side of the law within what amounted to minutes.
The chase that followed kicked off Friday around 5 p.m. The Sheriff’s Office got word that the Florida Highway Patrol was already pursuing a Ford SUV that had bolted from a reckless driving traffic stop near Mile Marker 83. Highway Patrol took the lead on the pursuit while the Sheriff’s Office assisted. The two agencies eventually brought the Ford to a stop near Mile Marker 61, where Chaucanes Vasquez was taken into custody and hauled straight back to the jail he had just left.
The Detail That Makes It Worse
Here is the part that adds another layer to the story. Before he ever grabbed the SUV, deputies say Chaucanes Vasquez broke into a different vehicle sitting in that same lot. What he allegedly walked away with was not cash or anything valuable in the usual sense. It was an iPhone charger.
For that break-in, the Sheriff’s Office charged him with theft and burglary of an unoccupied vehicle. The Highway Patrol, meanwhile, filed multiple charges tied to the stolen Ford and the chase that came after it. So a man who had just regained his freedom now faces a fresh stack of charges built around a stolen SUV and a phone charger lifted from someone else’s car in a courthouse parking lot.
A Near-Identical Replay From Days Earlier
What makes this case stand out is how closely it mirrors the arrest that put him in that jail in the first place. Just days before, on June 9, 2026, Chaucanes Vasquez allegedly fled from the Sheriff’s Office on U.S. 1 and pushed his speed all the way up to 125 mph. That is not aggressive driving. That is the kind of velocity that turns any small mistake on a public road into a deadly one…