Pasco sheriff gets his man after high-speed chase

LAND O' LAKES (FOX 13) - The driver of a stolen car was probably surprised when deputies spotted him cruising through Land O' Lakes this morning.  He was probably even more surprised that the sheriff himself was among those who chased him down.

According to the Pasco Sheriff's Office, it all started just before noon when a Pasco deputy on U.S. 41 ran a tag on a vehicle that turned out to be stolen.  When the deputy tried to pull the car over, the driver took off north at nearly 100 mph. 

The pursuit was called off at that point, but Sheriff Chris Nocco was in the area, heard the radio chatter about the chase, and then spotted the fleeing vehicle.  He began to trail it, the sheriff's office said, until an FHP trooper also spotted the car and made a U-turn to follow it.

That's when the stolen car again sped off.

"It was at this point that the sheriff became involved in the pursuit," a PCSO press release stated.

The stolen car travelled down Bowman Road, across the overpass of the Suncoast Parkway, and stopped in a wooded area of Shady Hills.

The sheriff, along with another deputy and the FHP trooper, drew their weapons and arrested the driver.  He was later identified as Daniel Werther.  

"I jumped out, drew my gun, and then [the other deputy] and the trooper came out and pointed it at him. And basically, in very colorful language, told him he better put his hands up and not move again because it wasn't gonna end pretty for him if he was going to try to run us over," the sheriff recalled.

Records show Werther, 30, has been arrested previously on domestic battery and credit card fraud charges.