A red Chevrolet Corvette can be a head-turning piece of American engineering. With the right driver behind the wheel, it’s a machine that earns respect on the road and at car shows alike. But when a trooper with the Arkansas State Police spotted one heading north on Interstate 55 on the morning of June 15, the car wasn’t turning heads for the right reasons. It had a cover over its license plate, and a quick check revealed the registration had lapsed back in March. Not exactly a recipe for a quiet Sunday drive.
Trooper Arellano lit up his lights at around 8:22 a.m. near the 55-mile marker in Mississippi County. The Corvette did not slow. When the siren came on, smoke poured from the exhaust and the car accelerated. Whoever was behind the wheel had clearly decided that a conversation with law enforcement was not on the morning agenda, and the Corvette did what Corvettes do when someone puts their foot down: it moved.
According to the Arkansas State Police incident report, the trooper’s radar clocked the vehicle at over 150 mph during the pursuit, with speeds reaching 156 mph at the high end. That’s not a number you see on many speed limit signs in Arkansas, and it made for a tense chase northbound through the state. The situation crossed into Missouri, where Missouri State Highway Patrol troopers had positioned themselves near the 4-mile marker with tire deflation devices ready and waiting…