Guffey Elementary School was put on lockdown for about 10 minutes this morning (Jan. 8) while police pursued a man who stole a delivery truck from the Gravois Bluffs shopping center in Fenton and ended up driving through the school campus during the chase, authorities reported.
The school, one of 11 elementaries in the Fox C-6 School District, is located along southbound Hwy. 141 in the Fenton area of Jefferson County.
At 9:30 a.m., St. Louis County Police responded to a call that a man had entered the Pier 1 store in the shopping center and tried to steal a female employee’s purse, St. Louis County Police reported in a written statement.
The suspect told the woman to give him her purse, implying he had a gun but not displaying one.
“The suspect also stated something to the effect of, ‘I’m gonna shoot you,’ to the employee,” the report said.
Then, the suspect ran out of the store and left in an AraMark delivery truck he allegedly stole from the parking lot.
“A responding police officer arrived on the scene and observed an AraMark delivery truck pulling away from the scene. At the same time, a man, who was the actual driver of the delivery truck, advised the officer that the AraMark truck was his and it had just been stolen,” according to the report.
The officer followed the suspect in the truck south on Hwy. 141.
During that pursuit, the suspect drove the truck onto the Guffey Elementary School parking lot, and then a tow truck driver who also happened to be on the school lot saw what was happening and used his tow truck to block the suspect’s truck from getting from 13th Street back out onto Hwy. 141, and the delivery truck struck the tow truck, the report said.
After the accident, a police officer approached the delivery truck, and the suspect tried to flee, but the officer used a stun gun on the man and took him into custody, according to the report.
The tow truck driver was not hurt, St. Louis County Police Officer Shawn McGuire said.
He said the suspect was transported to an area hospital for evaluation.
McGuire said he did not know the suspect’s age or hometown.
He said St. Louis County Police will handle the case involving the attempted theft of the purse and the theft of the delivery truck at Gravois Bluffs, and the Missouri State Highway Patrol will handle the case involving the accident at Guffey Elementary School.
Fox acting Superintendent Tim Crutchley said school personnel noticed the police pursuing the truck in the parking lot and the school immediately “went into lockdown,” which means students were locked inside classrooms.
The school’s exterior doors are always kept locked, Crutchley added.
He said law enforcement officials let school staff know when the man was in custody and then the lockdown ended.