27 Jun 2026, Sat

This Guy Left Jail and Immediately Stole a Car From the Courthouse Parking Lot

Most people walk out of jail and try to stay out of sight. Florida authorities say a 23-year-old from Miami Gardens did the exact opposite — leaving custody and almost immediately stealing a Ford SUV from the courthouse parking lot before leading officers on his second high-speed chase in under a week. The whole thing reads like someone who took nothing away from getting caught the first time, because the second arrest looks remarkably like the first.

Out the Door and Straight Back Into Trouble

Jefry Julian Chaucanes Vasquez was released from the Monroe County jail on June 12, 2026. According to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office, he wasted no time. Deputies say that right after walking out, he stole a Ford SUV from the Plantation Key Courthouse parking lot and took off — putting himself back on the wrong side of the law within minutes. The pursuit that followed began that Friday around 5 p.m.

An iPhone Charger and a Burglary Charge

There’s an odd wrinkle here. Before grabbing the SUV, deputies say Chaucanes Vasquez broke into a different vehicle in that same lot. What he allegedly took wasn’t cash or anything obviously valuable — it was an iPhone charger. For that break-in, the Sheriff’s Office charged him with theft and burglary of an unoccupied vehicle, while the Highway Patrol filed multiple charges tied to the stolen Ford and the chase that followed. A man who had just regained his freedom now faces a fresh stack of charges built around a stolen SUV and a phone charger lifted from someone else’s car at a courthouse.

A Near-Identical Replay From Days Earlier

What makes the case stand out is how closely it mirrors the arrest that landed him in jail to begin with. Just days earlier, on June 9, 2026, Chaucanes Vasquez allegedly fled from the Sheriff’s Office on U.S. 1 and pushed his speed to 125 mph. That’s not merely aggressive driving — it’s the kind of velocity that endangers everyone on a busy corridor.

U.S. 1 through the Keys is a working road full of commuters, tourists, and locals just trying to get somewhere. Two separate chases on that stretch in under a week means everyone else out there was put at risk twice by the same driver. The 125-mph figure is the detail that should stick: at that speed there’s no margin for error and no protection for anyone in the way. The fact that no serious injuries were reported in either incident looks less like skill and more like luck — and luck tends to run out at the worst possible moment.

There’s also something pointed about the setting. Stealing a vehicle from a courthouse lot, of all places, suggests a complete indifference to consequences. The very building where the legal system does its work became the staging ground for the next crime.

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By Shawn Henry

Shawn Henry has been writing about cars long enough that it's less a job than a habit he can't shake. He covers a little of everything—classic machines, the newest tech, and wherever the industry happens to be heading—and he's the type who actually understands what's going on under the hood, not just how to describe it. Mostly, he just likes telling a good car story.

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