Anchorage police shot and killed a man who allegedly rammed a stolen pickup into patrol cars Tuesday morning in a neighborhood east of the Seward Highway and south of Tudor Road.
It started when someone called 911 because the man, later identified as 25-year-old Carl Bowie III, was looking through the windows of parked cars at the Dimond Center about 10:20 a.m., police spokeswoman Anita Shell said. Bowie noticed the person watching him and drove away in a dark green Ford F-150 pickup -- but not before the person saw the pickup's license plate, Shell said.
Police learned from a check of the license plate that the pickup had been reported stolen from a driveway near Victor Road and Dimond Boulevard about three hours earlier, Shell said. The pickup's owner left it in the driveway with the keys inside but the doors locked, she said. It's unclear how Bowie got inside. Officers started trailing the Ford near 88th Avenue and Lake Otis Parkway, the police spokeswoman said. They tried to stop it, but Bowie drove into a neighborhood off of Lake Otis, Shell said.
Police Chief Mark Mew spoke to reporters near the shooting scene at 53rd Avenue and Windflower Street.
"(The officers) followed the vehicle through neighborhoods around here, made a couple attempts to stop the vehicle with spike strips," Mew said. "He rammed a couple patrol cars."
Two officers fired at Bowie, killing him, Mew said. A woman passenger was uninjured, the police chief said.
The pickup landed in a snowbank next to a driveway at 53rd and Windflower. A body covered with a camouflage blanket lay in the driveway. A damaged police cruiser and smashed mailboxes could be seen nearby.
The officers involved in the shooting and the woman in the pickup were taken to police headquarters for questioning, Mew said. The officers' names will not be released for three days, Shell said.
Shell said an earlier statement by Mew that Bowie had escaped from a halfway house was untrue. According to the Department of Corrections, Bowie had been on parole and was avoiding his court-ordered supervision.
Court records show Bowie pleaded guilty in 2010 to two felony counts of vehicle theft.
Reach Casey Grove at casey.grove@adn.com or 257-4589.
By CASEY GROVE