An early Friday traffic stop of a reported stolen vehicle in northwest Denver turned into a highway chase, an injured officer, and a police PIT maneuver on Interstate 70 that ended with the suspect in custody.
Officers first pulled over the stolen vehicle near 45th Avenue and Zuni Street, according to the Denver Police Department. Police say the encounter escalated fast when the driver took off and ran over an officer’s foot during the getaway attempt. The pursuit moved onto eastbound I-70, where officers caught up and used a PIT maneuver near the Chambers Road exit to stop the car. The driver was taken into custody, and both the officer and the suspect were being evaluated for injuries. The department’s initial message did not include the suspect’s name or list any charges.
What a PIT maneuver does
The chase ended with a Precision Immobilization Technique, or PIT, a tactic in which a pursuing patrol car makes controlled contact with a fleeing vehicle to spin it and force a stop. Research summarized by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs notes that vehicle stability systems can affect how these maneuvers play out. Police training guides caution that, while effective for ending pursuits, the PIT carries risks for vehicle occupants and bystanders and is typically limited by departmental policy and supervisor approval, with training materials laying out best practices and strict conditions for its use.
Context: Denver's auto-theft efforts
The stop comes as Denver continues a multi-year push to rein in vehicle theft after a sharp spike earlier in the decade. Axios Denver reported a roughly 63% drop in reported car thefts between 2022 and 2025, following steps such as forming a dedicated auto-theft team and deploying license plate readers across the city. The department has also handed out hundreds of Bluetooth and GPS trackers as part of prevention and recovery programs, a move covered by CBS Colorado.
Denver police say Friday’s incident remains under investigation and that both the injured officer and the suspect were still being evaluated, according to the department’s post on X.
