Florida Man Offers Vodka To Police During Chase

A Florida man gave deputies in Highlands County something to talk about after he offered them a vodka spritzer during an active chase. It’s worth mentioning deputies were chasing the generous man and it’s likely the drink he was offering was stolen. All this happened as the suspect drove erratically in a Chrysler Pacifica minivan.

Someone left a bunch of nails point-up in roads and driveways.

It’s bad enough a single man was driving a Chrysler Pacifica – he just had to make things even weirder. According to Highlands County Sheriff’s Office, on April 19 a store called dispatch to report a man shoplifted several items, including some alcoholic beverages.

When deputies arrived, they found the man, 39-year-old Richard Christopher Smith of Miami, literally driving circles around the store. He took off, triggering the odd chase.

As you can see from bodycam footage shared by the sheriff’s office, as Smith drives by a deputy who’s out of his patrol car, the man leans out and extends what appears to be a tall can we can assume is the vodka seltzer, saying, “I was just going to give you a drink, that’s it.”

Instead of stopping for deputies, he continued on for several miles, his tires being spiked. The chase ended when he got into a front-end collision with another vehicle.

Things got even weirder, though. After Smith crashed the minivan, he tried to nonchalantly walk away while puffing on a cigarette like nothing happened. But he was surrounded, tased, and immediately arrested.

Then he asked why he was being arrested, replying, “You guys had fun, though, right?”

Everyone can come up with their own theories about Smith’s odd behavior, but to us it’s just another day of law enforcement activities in Florida. We swear it’s something in the water there that brings out the weirdness in some people.

Image via Highlands County Sheriff’s Office/Facebook