MINNESOTA CITY, Minn. – Police ended a 107 mph chase with spike strips – three sets of them — to stop a stolen pickup truck at entrance to Highway 61 from Rollingstone. Arrested without resistance was Jonathan Marquist Payton, 38, of Winona. This was about noon. It had been a bizarre chase. About 11 a.m. two men drove up to one of the men’s parents’ house on remote Bear Creek Road near Altura. There the men, ages 30 and 22, saw a car stuck in snow in the driveway. They offered the man next to the car to help pull it out. The man waved a bottle of blackberry brandy, pulled a handgun, jumped the men’s pickup, and drove off, leaving his car in the snow. The two men their pickup disappear down Bear Creek and called 911. They reported the vehicle heading down the rough unpaved road toward Rollingstone. A sheriff’s deputy began pursuit on County Road 248 near Rollingstone. The driver sped up, at and point was 107 mph on the two-lane road. The deputy radioed ahead for help. Winona police laid down a set of spike strips on Road 248. The driver evaded them. Down the road a bit another Winona officer laid down a second strip. The driver evaded them too. Finally, a third strip deflated three tires on the pickup. Arrest followed. At the jailhouse in Winona, police said that Payton first consented to a blood-alcohol test, then said no. He was taken to the hospital to be checked over. Meanwhile, back up Bear Creek, 12 miles back, deputies found the brandy bottle on the ground near the stuck-in-snow car and a Glok handgun with the serial number scratched off.
Goal to puncture, deflate. It’s not every day that police need three sets of spike strips to stop a speeding car. They can’t re-used. Replacements cost $150 each.
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Payton Tentative charges: Robbery, assault, possession of a firearm, removing a firearm serial number, fleeing police