Victim tells of hanging on to fleeing car's hood

NORFOLK

A grand jury will hear charges against a woman accused of driving off after stealing a purse - with the victim clinging to the hood of her car.

During a preliminary hearing Tuesday, Jeanette Balazsi testified that Jennifer Leigh Jones, 32, stole her purse as she shopped at the Bromley Shopping Center Food Lion near Military Highway in May. Balazsi said that she yelled and chased Jones outside, where she saw Jones struggling with a store employee as she stood at the door of her car parked in the fire lane. Balazsi said she stood in front of the car to try to stop Jones from leaving. Instead, Balazsi testified, Jones accelerated toward her.

"I thought if I don't get my feet off the ground, she will run over me," Balazsi testified. "I jumped onto the hood and grabbed on to the hood where the wipers are."

Balazsi said Jones sped into traffic on Military Highway, swerving and slamming on the brakes to try to shake her off.

"I was scared," Balazsi testified. "I honestly thought I would die."

A woman in the passenger seat of the car was screaming, Balazsi said, but she could not understand what the woman said.

Jones slowed and turned into a neighborhood, and Balazsi swung her legs around the driver's side of the car and jumped off. She suffered scrapes to her hands, arms and stomach and a bruised pelvis, but did not break any bones. Meanwhile, Jones turned around and left the neighborhood the same way she came in, Balazsi testified. Passers-by who stopped to help and called police relayed the license plate of the car, and a man on a motorcycle gave chase.

Police joined the pursuit and chased Jones for about a mile, testified Detective Michael Cosca. Jones sped at more than 65 miles an hour on city streets, running several red lights, Cosca said, and hitting other cars. The chase ended when Jones crashed on the on-ramp to Interstate 64 on Chesapeake Boulevard. Cosca said a 1 -year-old girl was in the back seat of the car, strapped into a car seat that was leaning over on its side rather than upright.

Judge S. Clark Daugherty sent felony charges of child neglect, attempted malicious wounding and eluding police to be heard by a grand jury. Prosecutor Elizabeth Nash withdrew charges of drunken driving and misdemeanors of petty larceny and hit and run, but said she would ask the grand jury to return indictments for felony charges.

Michelle Washington, (757) 446-2287, michelle.washington@pilotonline.com