Early Tuesday morning in Aurora, a high-tech plan to quietly tag a stolen car with a GPS dart did not go as planned. After a license-plate reader hit, officers tried to fire a StarChase tracking device from an unmarked unit, missed the shot, flipped on the lights and sirens, and watched the car slam into a median before crashing at Boiling Drive and North Hannibal Street. Three people bailed out on foot, sprinted into neighborhood backyards, and were later arrested with help from both Aurora and Denver police. Aurora officials said two adults and a juvenile were taken into custody and that no shots were fired.
Police Account And Arrests
According to the Aurora Police Department, officers in District 2 picked up the stolen vehicle after a Flock Safety license-plate reader alert, then followed it briefly in an unmarked car to deploy the StarChase equipment. The department's post includes video of the crash, the suspects running through the area, and the subsequent arrests.
Aurora police identified the two adults as 18-year-old Angelo Munguia and 18-year-old Watti Heng, along with a 17-year-old male. The department said the crashed vehicle had been reported stolen out of a neighboring city and that, at one point, a masked passenger pointed a gun at officers. No officers fired their weapons during the incident, according to the agency.
How The Tracking Tools Work
The device Aurora attempted to use is a vehicle-mounted GPS launcher that fires a small adhesive dart onto a target car. Once the dart sticks, officers can track the car remotely instead of engaging in a high-speed pursuit, a tactic aimed at reducing the danger of traditional chases.
WVXU reports that departments using sticky GPS darts say the system provides real-time location data after the device adheres to a vehicle, which can lower the risk to officers, suspects, and bystanders. Networks of license-plate readers such as Flock Safety feed hotlist-style alerts to dispatchers, and Aurora has been building a Real Time Information Center that combines camera feeds and plate-reader data to help locate stolen vehicles, according to the Aurora Police Department.
Privacy And Legal Questions
Sticky GPS darts also land squarely in an ongoing legal debate about how far police can go when tracking vehicles. Attaching a GPS device to private property raises Fourth Amendment concerns, and courts have treated similar technology cautiously.
Legal analysis notes that the Supreme Court's decision in U.S. v. Jones treated the use of GPS devices as a search, yet it also suggests that courts may permit pursuit-management tagging in limited circumstances tied to public safety. The key factors include whether officers have probable cause and whether the tagging happens directly in response to a crime, according to Juris Magazine. Departments that adopt the technology often pair it with policies, training, and oversight that are intended to reduce legal risk while cutting back on dangerous high-speed chases.
What Remains Unclear
Aurora's public post on the crash did not list specific charges for Munguia, Heng, or the 17-year-old. The department's news pages also remind readers that arrests are based on probable cause and that all suspects are presumed innocent, according to the Aurora Police Department.
The agency reiterated that the vehicle had been reported stolen from a neighboring city and that officers worked with Denver police while canvassing nearby yards to track down the three people who fled. We have asked Aurora police for updated booking and charging details and will add that information when officials make it available.
