An Oklahoma driver allegedly led a group of police officers on a high-speed chase and broadcast the encounter on Facebook Live.
Police said that Brenton Hager, of Oklahoma City, broadcast the pursuit over Facebook Live and shouted at police from his pickup truck, “Hey, hey, you want to see me on a high-speed chase?! I’m in a high-speed chase, bro!”
Authorities took Hager into custody after a two-hour pursuit where he drove his pickup truck at high speeds, ran over fields, and destroyed sections of fencing, police said.
Aerial footage of the incident from Oklahoma authorities show the driver of the Ford pickup truck plowing through previously untouched fields before he backs into a pond.
The video shows Hager leaving his vehicle and making a run for the woods. Police subdue him with a taser before taking him into custody.
Hager’s video of the live stream went viral and had many people talking long after the video had been removed from his public Facebook profile.
Multiple friends on Hager’s public Facebook profile offered prayers for the suspect, with some even posting memes related to the chase.
Hager’s aunt, Ashlee Rodriguez, told KFOR that she had called her nephew around the time of the alleged chase telling him to stop.
“I call him just to ask him to see can you just stop? You’re making it worse,” Rodriguez said.
She added that her nephew told her that he did not want to go to the county jail and wanted to be shot instead.
“He just said, ‘I been trying to do my best and nobody’s there and I don’t want to go to county,’” Rodriguez said. “I said, ‘They’re going to shoot you. They’re going to light you up.’ And he said, ‘That’s what I want.’”
Rodriguez said Hager had been battling drug addiction since he was 18 years old.
“It’s not an excuse but, 100 percent, the drugs. It really takes your soul and you become a completely different person,” Rodriguez said.