LOCAL : High-Speed Chase Goes From San Clemente to Anaheim

A high-speed chase from the immigration checkpoint near San Clemente ended early today in a spectacular crash at an Anaheim intersection that injured a police officer and three other people, according to police.

The stolen late-model luxury car, traveling through darkened city streets at an estimated 90 m.p.h. with its headlights shut off, clipped a car at the intersection of Harbor Boulevard and North Street. Police said it then slammed into a patrol car before coming to rest against a palm tree.

Police Lt. John Cross said that surprisingly, no one involved in the 4:50 a.m. accident was critically injured. A police officer suffered a cut head and a concussion. The police cruiser and the stolen car were both destroyed. None of the names of those involved in the accident were yet available for release, he said.

Border patrol officers started the chase when the two men in the stolen Lincoln Town Car, registered in New Jersey, apparently failed to stop at the checkpoint along the San Diego Freeway near Camp Pendleton. California Highway Patrol officers later picked up the chase. A CHP spokesman said the car sped at 115 m.p.h. with no lights before officers lost sight of it at the Harbor Boulevard off-ramp.

Although they had shaken their pursuers, the two men in the stolen car roared past the Anaheim police station still without headlights on and running red lights, and headed north on Harbor, according to witnesses. The accident occurred about two minutes after the car left the freeway.