Terrified motorist faced gun-wielding OC deputies after his loaner car was mistakenly reported stolen – Orange County Register

Jamie Rodgers was mildly curious when he noticed a line of Orange County Sheriff’s patrol cars driving near him on Toll Road 73 in Laguna Niguel one morning in June 2021.

Rodgers’ curiosity grew when one of the cars began swerving from one side to the other, creating a traffic obstruction.

“They must be looking for someone,” thought Rodgers, who was heading to his then-job as an athletic trainer at JSerra Catholic High School in San Juan Capistrano.

Rodgers, 39, a father of two young children, finally stopped, still thinking that perhaps police were pursuing a criminal hiding in the brush along the highway. But as he looked in his rearview mirror, he noticed that the police cars had stopped and a dozen officers were outside, pointing their service weapons and rifles in his direction.

Then came the words broadcast over a police loudspeaker: “You are considered armed and dangerous.” Do exactly as I say, otherwise you may be shot.

Rodgers, who still didn’t know why he was the center of such attention, prayed he would live long enough to find out.

“I think I’m going to get shot. I am a black man arrested in Orange County. … I’ve heard too many stories about it,” Rodgers said in an interview. “I think, I’ll be next.”

It turned out that Rodgers was driving a loaner vehicle that Car Pros Kia Huntington Beach had mistakenly reported as stolen. The report caught the attention of the Orange County Auto Theft Task Force, which traced the vehicle to Rodgers’ home in Costa Mesa and monitored it throughout the morning.

It took the police about 10 minutes on the highway to realize the error. But the memory still troubles Rodgers, who says he suffers from post-traumatic stress and is suing the dealership for negligence and emotional distress.

Rodgers said he was so disconcerted that it was difficult to follow police orders with a dozen muzzles pointed at him.

“I raise my hands, they tell me to move to the left, but I start to move to the right, out of fear,” he said. “(I said,) all right God, you have to take over, I don’t know what I’m doing right now. I’m about to get shot.

A police officer told him to pull his shirt up over his head so the police could see his belt. They made him walk backwards towards them. Slowly. They threw him to the ground, handcuffed him and placed him in the back of a patrol car, without explaining why he was being detained.

Officers eventually resolved the problem. Rodgers had been driving the loaner 2019 Kia Sportage for approximately two months while his own vehicle underwent extensive repairs at the dealership. Rodgers said the dealership misplaced the loan agreement — apparently it fell behind a filing cabinet. The dealership received a bill for unpaid tolls, couldn’t find the contract and assumed it must have been stolen, Rodgers said.

He said he lost his job as an athletic trainer because he could no longer concentrate and had flashbacks to passing police or driving on the 73 Toll Road. He now works in the ‘real estate.

“He had to reinvent himself,” said his lawyer, Scott Harlan. “The problem with these things is that involuntary bodily movement can result in death.”

Attorney Christian Scali, representing the Kia dealership, had no comment Friday.