Two arrested after high-speed chase

Curry County deputies arrested two men about 1:30 a.m. Saturday after a chase exceeding 100 mph through Clovis streets and on county roads.

One of the men, Gabriel Rodriguez, 20, is alleged to have escaped from a Texas jail.

Rodriguez was in the Curry County Adult Detention Center Saturday with charges including being a fugitive from justice, reckless driving, speeding, aggravated evading an officer, concealing identity, and four alcohol and drug charges.

A passenger in the car, Jeremiah Mascarenas, 24, also is being held in the detention center, charged with harboring a felon and accessory to concealing identity.

Rodriguez’s Texas charges were not immediately available.

Lt. Ron Hutchison of the Clovis Police Department said the chase began near the corner of 21st and Prince streets when police observed a speeding pickup truck that nearly caused a collision with a tractor-trailer and caused pedestrians to “jump out of the way to avoid being struck.”

Sheriff’s deputies took over the chase as the pickup left the city limits and called an off-duty deputy living in the north part of the county to place “stop sticks” on Highway 209 that would have blown the pickup truck’s tires. However, the pickup’s engine “blew up” several miles south of Broadview, Sheriff Roger Hatcher said.

According to a criminal complaint filed in Curry County Magistrate Court, when the driver was removed from the vehicle he refused to identify himself, smelled strongly of burnt marijuana and appeared intoxicated. Drugs and drug paraphrenalia were found in the vehicle, the complaint said.

On arriving in Clovis, the driver identified himself as David Flores, but finally was identified as Rodriguez and a warrant for his arrest from the state of Texas was found charging him with unauthorized absence from a community corrections facility.