Perryville police respond to weekend reports of shoplifting, suspicious person

A shoplifting suspect led Perryville, Missouri, law enforcement officers on a high-speed pursuit this weekend, and hours later, a suspicious person was reported in Perry County.

The first incident occurred at about 8:18 p.m. Saturday, when a woman from St. Mary, Missouri, led officers on a 15-mile-long high-speed pursuit after allegedly shoplifting from Dollar Tree in Perryville.

According to a probable-cause statement written by Perryville officer Jordan Lamb, officers were dispatched to the bargain store in reference to a woman reportedly shoplifting.

Lamb stated officers arrived in the Perry Plaza parking lot and made contact with a woman inside a parked van, later identified as 45-year-old Christine R. Price.

After ignoring multiple commands from the officer to roll down the window or open the vehicle’s locked door, the alleged shoplifter began to flee.

“Price then shifted the vehicle into drive and accelerated from the parking lot at a high rate of speed nearly striking me,” Lamb wrote.

Once out of the parking lot, Price traveled north through Perry County on U.S. 61 at speeds in excess of 90 miles per hour while weaving in and out of traffic with no regard for other vehicles on the roadway, according to the probable-cause statement.

“Price continued to ignore lights and sirens of several police vehicles and at one point drove off the roadway to avoid spike strips,” Lamb wrote.

The suspect vehicle nearly struck a Perry County sheriff’s deputy’s patrol unit at Route J in Ste. Genevieve County, according to the probable-cause statement, then turned back onto U.S. 61 and traveled south toward St. Mary.

The pursuit ended on Sixth Street in St. Mary when Price jumped from the vehicle and attempted to flee on foot before quickly being taken into custody, Lamb stated.

Price faces charges in Perry County for one class E felony count of resisting arrest and creating a substantial risk to others and one class E felony count of stealing. She has three prior offenses for stealing and is being held in lieu of $10,000 cash-only bond at the Perry County Jail, according to the arrest warrant.

Suspicious person reported

Another incident occurred the next day when the Perry County Sheriff’s Office received a call regarding a suspicious person.

According to an email from Perry County Sheriff Gary Schaaf, the caller told officers a man knocked on her door at 3:18 a.m. Sunday morning seeking entry into her home to use her phone.

The suspicious person claimed to have seen a person with a gunshot wound to the neck walking down a county road in front of the home, Schaaf stated.

“The resident correctly refused to allow entry and told the [suspicious] person she would call law enforcement for them,” the email stated.

After retrieving her phone and a handgun for self-protection, the caller returned to the door and saw the suspicious person “speedily leaving the residence,” according to the release.

The email stated deputies conducted a search of the area but found no evidence of anyone walking the nearby roadways.

“We have no evidence that anyone was in that area, injured, at that time,” Schaaf stated in the email. “So if there was no injured person, we have to suspect the person was just trying to talk his way into the house for nefarious purposes.”

The email described the suspicious person as a white man in his 30s with a scruffy beard and wearing dark colored pants and jacket. The vehicle was described as a dark-colored, older-model sedan.

According to the release, deputies did not see any vehicle matching that description while they searched the roadways.

“The resident did the right thing in refusing entry and calling law enforcement immediately,” Schaaf stated.