A 16-year-old boy injured last week in a Pima County Sheriff’s Department chase will not be charged in an attack on his grandmother, but the 13-year-old boy who drove the fleeing SUV faces numerous charges, authorities said Monday.
The teens escaped serious injury in the April 8 rollover that ended a chase by sheriff’s deputies from Tucson’s Northwest Side to the Picacho area in Pinal County, sheriff’s spokeswoman Deputy Dawn Barkman said.
The boys were being sought in connection with an attack on the elder teen’s 56-year-old grandmother, police spokesman Officer Charles Rydzak said.
The boys had left a group home and showed up at the grandmother’s home, near East Glenn Street an North Craycroft Road, authorities said.
When she tried to call police, the younger boy punched her in the face, Barkman and Rydzak said. And when the woman tried to block the door to her garage, the 13-year-old cut her on the arms with a steak knife, they said.
The younger boy stole the woman’s 2009 Lexus sport utility vehicle and fled with her grandson in the passenger seat, the Barkman and Rydzak said.
Barkman said a sheriff’s deputy spotted the SUV about 3:45 a.m. at West Orange Grove Road near Interstate 10 and signaled the driver to stop.
The driver fled, eventually losing control of the SUV on state Route 87, about 10 miles north of Picacho Peak, Barkman said.
The 16-year-old was examined for neck pain and released from a hospital, Barkman said; the 13-year-old was not injured.
Rydzak said the 16-year-old will not be charged because he did not commit the assault on his grandmother or steal her car.
The 13-year old was turned over to the Pima County Juvenile Court Center, where he faces charges of endangerment, criminal damage, auto theft, aggravated assault and felony fleeing from a law enforcement officer, Rydzak said.
Authorities would not release the boys’ names because of their ages.