In the middle of a televised chase on Orange County streets and highways during the evening rush-hour drive Monday, viewers were told the driver was a suspect wanted for dealing heroin in Buena Park. But when the dust settled–or, in this case, the perp was in custody–it was revealed that 36-year-old Jimison “Jaymo” Coleman of Dallas is wanted in Texas for a 2014 killing.
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Buena Park Police got a report of a man selling drugs at a Motel 6, but an arriving officer noticed that the license plate number on the suspect's silver Mercedes matched that of a vehicle Dallas Police were looking for in connection with the 2014 heroin overdose death of 19-year-old Rian Lashley of Dallas. Coleman is suspected of selling Lashley the China White.
When officers approached the Mercedes, Jaymo fled and led them on a chase that reached speeds of 80 mph on the 5 and 91 freeways. With at least four marked Buena Park Police Department units on Coleman's tail, the Mercedes finally came to a stop at Barranca Parkway and Armstrong Avenue in Irvine.
Just after 6:20 p.m. Wednesday, Coleman got out of the sedan, dropped to his knees with hands up and then crawled on his hands and knees toward cops pointing their weapons at him.
Coleman had only been charged with possession of a controlled substance with intent to sell as of Tuesday morning at Buena Park Police HQ, although evading arrest counts were likely. But later in the day, John Parker, acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas, announced a federal criminal complaint unsealed in the Lone Star State charged Coleman with conspiracy to possess with the intent to distribute heroin.
The defendant made his first appearance in a federal courtroom in Santa Ana Tuesday afternoon, but Coleman is expected to be returned to Dallas by U.S. marshals to be prosecuted for an alleged scheme to rob Lashley of about $3,000, her cell phone and an iPad by incapacitating her with heroin.
Cierra Allyn Rounds, 27, of Dallas, already pleaded guilty to the same offense stemming from her role Lashley's death and is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 8. Glen William Brunton, 28, has filed plea papers indicating his intention to plead guilty to similar charges, while 25-year-old co-defendant Kathryn Grace Dirks is a fugitive. Hey, anyone check the Motel 6?
The penalty for the charged offense against Coleman is not more than 20 years in federal prison and a $1 million fine, according to Parker.
Email: mc****@oc******.com. Twitter: @MatthewTCoker. Follow OC Weekly on Twitter @ocweekly or on Facebook!
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.