Woman arrested after chase ends in crash

A Pulaski County woman was arrested early Friday afternoon after a police chase through the worst of Conway's lunch-hour traffic ended with a crash in the Conway Commons parking lot.

The incident started at the Walmart on Harkrider Street, where store management called police to report a woman making expensive purchases with apparently stolen credit cards. Police responded and located the woman, later identified as 36-year-old Sherry Hinton of Wrightsville, a small community south of Little Rock.

Two officers tried to stop Hinton after she got to her silver Chevrolet Impala in the Walmart parking lot, according to Conway Chief of Police A. J. Gary, and Hinton "swerved toward both of them, trying to hit both officers with the vehicle and she ended up running over one officer's left foot."

She left the parking lot driving at what officers estimated to be 70 miles per hour and headed north on Harkrider, right past Faulkner County Sheriff's Office deputy Chad Wooley, who said he was on his way to the Faulkner County Courthouse when he heard dispatch advise that a female suspect in a silver car was fleeing from CPD officers in the area.

Wooley initiated pursuit, he said, and was joined by CPD cruisers in pursuing the woman as she drove "recklessly, weaving in and out of the turning lane" in heavy traffic before getting on Interstate 40 eastbound at the 125 interchange and accelerating to speeds over 100 miles per hour.

After a few minutes on the interstate Hinson was confronted by an Arkansas State Police cruiser and did a U-turn through the median, heading back west on I-40 and exiting onto East Oak Street at the 124 interchange.

She again drove recklessly through heavy East Oak Street traffic, Wooley said, turning onto Amity Road and into the west Conway Commons Parking lot. Hinson drove at high speed around the edge of the parking lot and was apparently trying to get back onto Amity Road when her car hit a curb, disabling it. She tried to flee on foot, but was apprehended.

Gary said CPD investigators believe the credit cards Hinson was trying to use to buy several hundred dollars worth of merchandise at Walmart had been stolen from Conway Regional Medical Center earlier Friday morning, and possibly from a local bridal shop as well.

Conway Regional spokesperson Lori Ross confirmed that two wallets were taken from staff break rooms sometime mid-morning, and that hospital security "told (the victims) to immediately call the banks and report the cards stolen, and that's how they caught her when she tried to use them."

Two suspects described as black females were reported to have stolen the credit cards, Gary said, and a second woman may have been with Hinton trying to use them at Walmart. Police were following leads Friday to try and locate this woman, he said, but she had not been arrested at press time.

Hinton faces charges that could include six counts of theft by receiving and two counts of aggravated assault, one for each officer she allegedly tried to run down in the Walmart parking lot. She was being held Friday night on a $50,000 bond.

(Staff writer Joe Lamb can be reached at 505-1238 or by E-mail at joe.lamb@thecabin.net. Send us your news at www.thecabin.net/submit.)