A Miami cabbie shot three people – none of whom sustained life-threatening injuries – after a routine traffic stop turned into a cop-car hijacking, police chase and multiple location shootout. “Miami Fire Rescue said it began when a cab driver got upset at the cab company, miami.cbslocal.com reports, “and started breaking things. [?] He then sped off in a taxi. A police officer in the area spotted him speeding at NW 79th Street and 4th Avenue and moved in to make a traffic stop . . .
The taxi cab driver exited the vehicle and opened fire on the officer with a high-powered rifle,” said City of Miami Police Officer Frederica Burden.
A woman passing by the scene was hit and taken to the hospital, according to police . . .
Detectives say the cab driver then jumped into the running police cruiser and took off.
During the chase a police car was involved in a fender bender at NW 7th Avenue and 95th Street.
With Miami and North Miami police closing in, the gunman bailed out of the car near Biscayne Boulevard and 95th Street.
The cab driver once again started shooting. During that shootout another innocent woman was hit–as well as the gunman.
The suspect was taken into custody near San Souci Boulevard and NW 115th Road at the Tropicana Apartments. Chopper 4 over the scene showed paramedics working on him.
The suspect was airlifted to Jackson Memorial Hospital. No word on his condition.
No doubt anti-gun hay will be made by the cabbie’s possession of an “assault rifle.” Updates as we receive them,
Probably a .22.
Also, conspicuous absence of the word “assault” in the descriptor.
What does “high-powered rifle” mean here? Was it an actual big-bore rifle? Or something in the .22 realm that is semi-auto and looks scary? If the former, we may be looking at another “sniper rifle” scare from the antis instead of the usual “assault weapon” nonsense.
IMO, “high powered rifle” means a 10/22 with after market stock. This is the media reporting, and if they call a .223/5.56 a high powered weapon of war, (for a .22, its no slouch) then somebody is a dunce. A 300 win mag is high powered, so is .338 lapua, so is a .416 barret, so is a .498 Fienstien (I live in CA, sue me). Bet you my next paycheck if some idiot shot at a political figure with a sling shot, the media would report attempted murder with a deadly weapon. (those lil wrist rockets can leave a welt for days!)
/rant ended
Evidently he was not using any of that cop killing M855 ammo, or else the whole block would be dead now.
You can see the gun in the video. It’s a pistol of some kind, chambered in a rifle round. Not sure exactly what it is.
Yeah, it’s definitely not an AR, but it doesn’t really look like an AK either. Didn’t see a stock on the thing. Maybe some firearms wizard can ID it.
Kel-Tec PLR-16: http://www.keltecweapons.com/our-guns/plr-16/pistol/
Looks like you got that right. A .223 pistol with about 9″ of barrel. Clearly not quite as lethal as the “assault rifle” press would have us believe. Thank God the officers and bystanders weren’t badly hurt. If the bad guy didn’t survive surgery, I’d still sleep soundly tonight.
In the video the weapon looks like a pistol. But the “News” people keep referring to it as a rifle. Not sure what is going on there. Either they don’t have a clue about pistols vs rifles or the picture is not very good. But two times the video shows a weapon that looks like a pistol and both time the news person calls it a rifle. Seems more likely the cab driver would have a pistol than a rifle for protection. Rifles are too big, too hard to hide and to hard to maneuver for a cab driver to carry on a regular basis.
It’s ugly, but I’d have trouble figuring out how to classify it beyond that…
Possibly with a folding stock.
It looks like a Kel-Tec PLR-16: http://www.keltecweapons.com/our-guns/plr-16/pistol/ At least one version has a hand guard with rails.
Just a couple days late for the anniversary of the North Miami Shootout, 4-11-1986.
It doesn’t look like all bad news for gun owners since an armed citizen save the life of a trained professional. “Our officer returned fire and a good Samaritan provided cover and rescued him while the offender continued to shoot at him with an assault rifle,” said Javier Ortiz, President of the Miami Fraternal Order of Police. “The Fraternal Order of Police wants to thank this good Samaritan for putting his life on the line to save one of our brothers.”
“That good Samaritan is a hero,” said Oriz. “No doubt he is a hero. He helped this officer through thick and thin in a war zone. Some people would just pick up a cell phone and take video but this man helped.”
Ortiz said he would try to see if the Miami City Commission would honor the good Samaritan with a commendation.”
http://miami.cbslocal.com/2015/04/14/taxi-shooting-leads-to-miami-police-chase/
Maybe I miss read that.
I don’t think the “good Samaritan” was armed. He “provided cover” for the cop with his van, not with a firearm.
I live in Miami, and the stolen car passed by the golf course I work at. Rumor is that he may have tried to pull into the parking lot but was blocked by police cars (or oncoming traffic) and kept going another mile or so. Just thinking all day I could have potentially been shot by a cop car jacking nut. And to keep this TTAG relevant, carrying any kind of weapon= insta-fired.