- April 24, 2024
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A high-speed car chase began with gunshots Friday morning, in Volusia County, and ended with a rollover crash in Palm Coast after the pursued car struck a truck and spun out onto the shoulder of the road.
The chase started when Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents moved in to arrest two men — Radbourne Mark Anthony Saleem, 38, and Leopold Michael Saleem, 27 — who were trying to buy machine guns from undercover agents, ATF spokesman Kevin Richardson said.
"The subjects were in the process of fleeing when they were affecting the arrest," Richardson said. "When they realized they were going to be arrested, they hit two of the arrest team's vehicles and were heading toward the arresting agents. The car became a weapon at that point."
ATF agents fired at the suspects, hitting both.
But bullets didn't stop the suspects. The car lurched onto U.S.1 — law enforcement vehicles close behind — and headed north into Flagler County.
The driver lost control of the car and struck the rear end of a pickup truck near a Hess station in Palm Coast not far over the county line, and the car flipped and landed on the side of the road. The driver of the truck was not injured, Richardson said.
The two suspects are in stable condition at Halifax Health Medical Center.
The area surrounding the crash — about a mile-long stretch of U.S. 1 with the Hess Express station at its center — was closed through the early evening Friday as teams from ATF, Florida Highway Patrol, the Volusia County Sheriff's Office and the Flagler County Sheriff's investigated the crash and the shooting.
