Family's vehicles crashed following police chase

The thunderous sound of a metal crashing into metal jolted the neighborhood during an otherwise quiet Sunday morning.
Jim Milliken was seated at the kitchen table with his 13-year-old daughter. His wife, Monica, was in the bedroom napping.
"It was like a freight train going through a steel wall," Milliken said of the sound of a 2009 Toyota Camry crashing into the right rear panel of his 1994 Mazda B4000 pickup.
Another neighbor compared it to a space shuttle launch.
In the bed of the truck were a few pieces of patio furniture. They flew into the air and zoomed past the front door and lay scattered across the lawn, Milliken said.
The impact was so forceful it lifted the rear of the truck high enough to clear the 3-foot tree stump in the yard. It came to rest a few inches shy of the house, said his wife.
The Toyota, driven by Douglas Lewis Jones Jr., traveled another 10 yards along the front yard and crashed into Monica Milliken's van, which was parked along the second driveway.
The second collision caused the entire window above the right rear panel to shatter. Shards of glass still lay along the street last week.
Monica Milliken jumped out of bed and ran to the front door. Her husband already was outside.
She told him to look inside the Toyota. The driver was gone.

Insurance woes

The couple have five children, ranging in ages from 3 to 16. Neither the pickup nor the van is safe enough to drive, they said.
Their insurance policy lapsed a few days before the Dec. 27 accident.
Jim Milliken works as a lab technician in Sumterville. His wife stays at home with the children. They still owe on a mortgage and live paycheck to paycheck. They didn't pay their car insurance on time because they were short, they said.
Monica Milliken intended to renew the policy the next day.
"I was like, 'Well, I'll just take care of it on Monday,'" she said, recalling her thought process when the payment deadline passed. "I knew I was getting money for Christmas."
The car driven by Jones was rented to his aunt, Lillie Woods. The vehicle is owned by Enterprise Rent-A-Car, authorities said.
Woods reported the car stolen, according to the Hernando County Sheriff's Office.
At first, the Millikens were unsure whether they could get any help to pay for their damaged vehicles.
Enterprise was uncooperative in the beginning, but after Monica Milliken contacted the Office of Insurance Regulation in Tallahassee, the employees at the rental car company changed their tone, she said.
"Under Florida law, the renter's insurance company has primary responsibility for damage caused in incidents such as these," said Ned Maniscalco, an Enterprise spokesman who was aware of the claims case. "Accordingly, we are in contact with our customer's insurance company."
Jim Milliken said he was encouraged when his wife was put in touch with an insurance adjuster after the initial stonewalling by Enterprise.
His wife was still skeptical. She still isn't sure whether she will ever receive the financial reimbursement she thinks she is owed.
"I won't believe it until I see it," she said.

Suspected drug dealer

Milliken's house is off Roper Road in Hill 'n Dale. The neighborhood is nestled alongside State Road 50, a few miles west of Interstate 75.
Jones, 20, of 1342 Brook Drive, was charged with grand theft auto, driving without a license, fleeing and eluding, reckless driving with damage to property, leaving the scene of an accident, driving with a suspended or revoked license and two counts of burglary of a dwelling.
He has been convicted numerous times of similar charges during the past three years, according to court records.
He was charged with burglary following the latest incident because he entered a man's house located behind Milliken's and later broke into a car parked in someone else's yard.
Troopers and deputies later discovered him hiding inside the car, authorities said.
He bolted seconds after the crash in front of the Milliken house, according to the Hernando County Sheriff's Office.
Woods showed up at the scene later. Jim Milliken said he overheard a trooper interrogating her after she claimed the car was stolen.
The trooper suspected Woods wasn't telling the truth, Milliken said.
Woods' phone number was not listed and she could not be reached for comment.
Troopers tried to pull over Jones as he was traveling along S.R. 50 because of tinted rear windows, said Sgt. Larry Krause, a spokesman with the Florida Highway Patrol.
"It was the kind of tint drug dealers use," Milliken said, recalling the conversation he had with the trooper at the scene. "They will often take the tint off and give the car back ... He was a typical drug runner."
Milliken also said a scale was discovered inside the car, but Jones had not been charged with possession of drug paraphernalia, according to arrest records filed by FHP and the sheriff's office.
"The tint on the windows kind of makes you wonder how long they had this vehicle and what they were doing with it," Krause said.
Enterprise said Woods has been forthright since day one.
"We are pleased with the cooperation we have received from our customer in this case," Maniscalco said. "She promptly notified both of us and the police when the vehicle was stolen and she provided us with the name of her insurer so we could work with them to resolve the claims related to this incident."

FHP said it called off chase; neighbors still angry

Jones took the car shortly after 9 a.m. that morning. Trooper Ricardo Valdes spotted the Camry along S.R. 50 near Interstate 75 and tailed it heading westbound toward Brooksville, according to a sheriff's report.
Valdes called off the pursuit as soon as Jones turned into the Hill 'n Dale subdivision, according to reports filed by FHP and the sheriff's office.
"The trooper terminated the pursuit on his own," Krause said.
Valdes began chasing Jones at 11:07 a.m. and by 11:10 a.m. dispatch was notified of the crash, said Krause.
The pursuit lasted about two minutes, he said.
Hill 'n Dale residents are not convinced the trooper abandoned the pursuit soon enough. Whether it was one or two cars driving at a high speed through the neighborhood, it was upsetting knowing it took place during the day while children were out of school for Christmas break, they said.
"The police followed them too far," said Ronnie Lee, who lives a few houses down from the Millikens. "It would've been sad if someone had gotten killed. They should've eased up."
Joan Hendrix, who lives a few blocks away from where the crash took place, said she heard the first car careening down the road. When she looked out the window, she saw the trooper's vehicle. She described it as a "white flash" zooming past her front yard.
"I don't care what he did or why he was running," she said. "Excessive high-speed car chases should not take place in 30 mph subdivisions. They weren't just driving fast. They were driving crazy fast."
Krause defended the trooper's response. He thinks he acted swiftly and had the neighbor's safety and security in mind when he stopped the pursuit.
"We didn't cause him to crash," Krause said. "We don't have any control over the driver ... No one got injured and I think we made a good judgment call."
"It is definitely necessary to pursue in some cases," he continued. "The trooper did cancel the pursuit in this case. As soon as he entered the neighborhood, he called it off."
Jones was traveling at a top speed of 95 mph, Krause said.

School starts Monday; Millikens pick up the pieces

Jim Milliken's son has a vehicle, but it hasn't run in more than a year. It's also not insured or tagged. He said he intends to take care of both next week so he can go to work.
His wife, however, has no way of taking the kids to school. Their second semester starts Monday.
The van still runs, but its rear window was reduced to a million pieces. Milliken also isn't sure how much damage was done to the undercarriage. It might not be road safe and neither he nor his wife wants to take that chance, he said.
"We're not sure yet what we're going to do," Milliken said.
No claims adjuster has arrived at the house. The couple still aren't sure whether Lillie Woods' insurance company would cover some or all of the cost. They had not had received a final answer as of Friday afternoon. Messages are being left, but they are not all being returned, they said.
"I won't be happy until everything is resolved," said Milliken, "and not until the Florida Highway Patrol realizes they shouldn't be chasing people through a residential neighborhood."