On Thursday morning, a police officer who was not on-duty was going home from job when he said he saw a horrific crime.
A white PT Cruiser travelling at high rate of speed passed his motor vehicle; the driver was driving erratically at the speed almost 100 mph. The officer pursued the vehicle for a short time, it was a brief chase. The car stopped on the Dick Misener Bridge in St. Petersburg, Florida.
Police spokesman Mike Puetz told PEOPLE, “The man reached into the back seat and grabbed the girl. Then he threw her over the railing and into the water”.
The officer said he heard a splash as the girl fell 62 ft. into the water below. He radioed for assistance and climbed over the railing himself, hoping to rescue the child by himself but he didn’t succeed.
The officer added, “He climbed down a ladder down one of the pylons. He couldn’t see her, because the current is extremely strong there”.
Rescue searchers approached the scene within a short time and asked 2 fishermen for help in finding the girl.
Bobby Hay, one of the fishermen, later told the reporters, “He said, ‘You know these waters – take me to where you think she’ll possibly be. So we ran right over where the tide was going one way and the wind was breaking the opposite way. That’s where I thought she’d be. We weren’t far off”.
There they found 5-year-old Phoebe Jonchuck and she was not breathing. She was taken to a nearby hospital by ambulance but did not survive.
A source in the Medical Examiner’s office told PEOPLE that they will perform an autopsy on Thursday to know if the reason of the death was the water or she was killed by the fall.
Meanwhile, other cops caught up with the man in the PT Cruiser. They took John Jonachuk, Phoebe’s biological father into custody. He was charged with first-degree murder, aggravated fleeing and eluding, and aggravated assault with a motor vehicle on a law enforcement officer.
On Thursday afternoon, he is summoned for his bond hearing.
The reason why the man did that is not known and the police also have no idea why he did that.
Puetz added, “You just can’t get inside someone’s head to know why they’d do that. It’s just tragic”.
News Source: www.People.com