One of five people from Columbia charged in connection with a pursuit with local authorities in April has pleaded guilty to the charge against her.
Tashianna Pitts, 28, pleaded guilty to one count of felony stealing during a Tuesday hearing before Cole County Presiding Judge Pat Joyce. Prosecutors dismissed a charge of resisting a lawful stop.
Pitts was among a group authorities said stole items at Dick's Sporting Goods on Stoneridge Parkway then fled and were eventually caught in Boone County.
Laronya N. Brown, 21, Erneisha Dorema, 18, Reginald J. Guy, 27, and Antanesha Jones, 17 - all of Columbia - are still awaiting court hearings on charges of stealing and resisting a lawful stop. Brown was also charged with failure to obey a traffic control device.
Brown admitted to being the driver of a Kia Soul that Jefferson City Police Department officers attempted to stop - according to a probable cause statement from JCPD - after receiving a call from Dick's Sporting Goods that several suspects had fled the store with a large amount of clothing.
Probable cause statements detail that while inside the store, the defendants grabbed clothing and placed the items into green plastic totes from the store - totaling more than $3,700 of unpurchased merchandise. The defendants then left the store through the front doors, according to police.
Police said the suspects left the area in the Kia Soul - which a store employee provided a description of - at a high speed.
Officers located the vehicle on Missouri Boulevard, where the Kia ran a red light at the intersection with Kansas Street. That prompted officers to turn their emergency lights and sirens on in an attempt to have the vehicle pull over, but the vehicle failed to yield and fled at speeds that reached 119 mph as it traveled onto U.S. 54 and crossed the Missouri River bridge and onto northbound U.S. 63.
Officers said the occupants of the vehicle threw clothing and large totes from the Kia into the roadway as they fled, and the merchandise was subsequently recovered by assisting officers.
The Highway Patrol ended the pursuit in Boone County by deploying tire-deflation devices; after the vehicle was disabled, all five occupants were taken into custody and held at Cole County Jail.
Police said Dorema was the passenger in the front seat, and Guy, Jones and Pitt were passengers in the back seats.
After being read his rights, Guy first admitted and then denied entering the sporting goods store, according to police. He also denied stealing items but admitted to seeing the other four leaving the store with merchandise and fleeing in his vehicle. He told police he never stopped the other four, and fled in the vehicle with them - never asking Brown to stop the vehicle.
Jones said she initially encouraged Brown to flee, according to police. Brown allegedly admitted to stealing, as did Jones.
Dorema denied stealing and refused to answer the question when presented with video footage from the store to the contrary, according to police.
Jones and Dorema told police that Pitts was not with them - though police said all five individuals were visible stealing on video footage inside the store, wearing the clothes they were arrested in.
Pitts tried to communicate with the other four suspects while in custody at JCPD, "yelling through the walls, attempting to coach them into implicating another person," according to police.