Two flee stolen SUV at St. E's, are arrested

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

Police arrested a man who was spotted in an SUV reported stolen from the South Side on Monday morning inside a bathroom in the emergency room at St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital.

Reports said an officer had spotted a Pontiac Aztec about 10:15 a.m. that had been reported stolen about a half-hour earlier at a Market Street gas station. A woman was driving, and a man was in the passenger seat.

Reports said when the officer turned around to check out the SUV, it pulled onto Parmalee Avenue and then stopped in front of a medical office building.

Both the man and woman jumped out of the SUV and ran around the building. The officer followed in his cruiser to the back of the building also, but when he got inside, he was told the two ran through the hallway and out the front door.

An ambulance driver told police he saw a man and woman run into the emergency room at the hospital across the street. A few minutes later, Humility of Mary Health Partners Police reported they had arrested one of the people matching the description of the man in the car, 20-year-old Braielyn Jones of Magnolia Avenue.

They found him in a bathroom.

Reports said the woman who was driving, Dominique Dodson, 26, of West Delason Avenue, asked police what was going on and why her boyfriend was in a police cruiser. Reports said an officer told her he saw her driving an SUV that was reported stolen and he asked her where she got the SUV. She hesitated before saying it was her boyfriend’s. She was arrested on a charge of receiving stolen property and also given a citation for driving under suspension.

The owner of the SUV, a 40-year-old Sharon, Pa., man, was brought to the hospital and identified Jones as the person who took his vehicle.

Reports said the owner told police he had picked up Jones on Oak Hill Avenue and had given him rides in the past. The vehicle owner stopped at the gas station to get gas, and when he went inside to pay, reports said Jones slid into the driver’s seat and drove away.

Jones was arrested on a charge of theft of a motor vehicle. Jones and Dodson were booked into the Mahoning County jail and are expected to be arraigned in municipal court Wednesday.