Residents of a Tarzana neighborhood woke up with a start Saturday morning after a Lamborghini SUV fleeing police roared down their street, crashed into several cars and then caught fire.
The crash occurred around 4 a.m. in the 5500 block of Tampa Avenue, where residents say they found the black van upside down and a trail of destruction behind it. Neighbors pulled the driver out of the vehicle.
“At first we didn't think he was alive,” a resident named Tristan told OnSceneTV, a breaking news service. “He didn't respond and finally made a sound and that's when we pulled him out.”
The Los Angeles Police Department said the vehicle was being pursued by the California Highway Patrol. Details about why he was being pursued were not immediately available.
The pickup truck collided with several vehicles, knocking over a concrete mailbox and landing upside down, resident Gina Patterson said. He said he heard the crash, went outside and saw a person lying on the ground.
The vehicle caught fire shortly after, neighbors told OnSceneTV. Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics took a 35-year-old man in serious condition to the hospital, according to LAFD spokeswoman Margaret Stewart.
