A local policeman was being hailed as a real life action hero on Monday when he decided to head straight at a speeding wrong-way driver on a highway.
The real life “Fast & Furious” situation reared its dangerous head as Blue Ash Police Sgt. Mike Jackson went in pursuit of a reported wrong-way driver on Interstate 71 in Ohio.
Around 9:15 a.m., 25-year-old Kelsey Peterson got onto the highway near Sycamore Township, only in the exact wrong direction of traffic. As reported by local station Fox 19, for over a little more than a mile cars swerved around Peterson, and she barely missed a head-on collision with an Ohio State Patrol trooper, but did cause one nonfatal crash.
As Sgt. Jackson raced to the scene, he saw Peterson zooming in the high speed lane towards him, and hit his siren and lights, but soon realized this driver was probably not going to simply pull over. So he made the courageous decision to head straight for Peterson.
As he tells his fellow officers in the extended body camera video, “I thought she was going to hit me,” Jackson said. “I was coming down... She was careening everywhere and, like, moving over… I was like, man, this is going to hurt.”
He got so close that, as he explained, “I can see her face and see, she is just not there.”
Luckily, the dashcam shows that as Sgt. Jackson approached and slowed up, so too did Peterson, as her SUV stopped just inches from the cop car.
Via dash and bodycam footage, we see the officer eventually opening the passenger side door and quickly noticing a very impaired Peterson. Empty White Claw cans were strewn about the car, and Sgt. Jackson noted a strong sense of alcohol.
Peterson was arrested for OVI (Operating a Vehicle Impaired) and driving on a suspended license. She is also facing charges of driving the wrong way and causing an accident. Her bond was set at 10 percent of $1,000, and was released following a hearing on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, the Blue Ash Police Department awarded Sgt. Jackson for his actions. The police chief gave him a commendation for courage.
At the end of the body cam clip, his fellow officers gave Jackson some fist bumps, which must have felt even better at that heart-racing moment.
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