A South Philadelphia man is facing charges for leading officers on a wild chase through Point Breeze Saturday night while carrying an illegal gun, and then struggling when they tried to arrest him, police said Tuesday.
Andre Evans, 29, of Ringgold Street near Dickinson, faces several charges including aggravated assault and violation of the Uniform Firearms Act related to fleeing and assaulting two police officers that night, according to a Philadelphia Police Department release.
Officers first made contact with Evans at 7:23 p.m., when they spotted him driving a silver Infiniti QX70 with a license plate registered to a Nissan on 18th Street near Reed, police said. They tried to pull the suspect over, police said, but he took off and sped a few blocks until he hit several parked cars and crashed into a building on Wharton Street just west of Broad.
On Wharton Street, police said, Evans jumped out of the Infiniti with a gun in his hand and fled from officers on foot. The officers chased him several blocks, ordering him to surrender. On Carlisle Street near Federal, Evans turned toward the officers with the gun still in his hand, prompting both officers to shoot at him, police said. They missed, though, and the suspect continued to run, eventually falling and dropping his handgun in front of a house on Carlisle Street.
Evans then got up and kept running north on Carlisle Street, when another officer arrived at the scene and deployed his Taser at him, police said. He then ran west on Federal Street from Carlisle, where officers caught up with him and handcuffed him after a short struggle, police said.
After police arrested Evans, they took him to Jefferson University Hospital to be treated for lacerations to his forehead and left hand, police said. The gun he'd been carrying, a Glock 22 .40-caliber pistol with an extended magazine and an obliterated serial number, was recovered by officers on Carlisle Street, police said, and the Infiniti he'd been driving was towed from Wharton Street near Broad.
No officers were injured in the incident, and police said the two officers who fired their weapons at the man have been placed on desk duty pending the outcome of an Internal Affairs investigation, as is protocol with any police-involved shooting.
