Fresno County Sheriff’s deputies have arrested 43 year old George Boston of Orange Cove.
He has been released from the hospital and booked into the Fresno County Jail. He is facing charges of auto theft, evading police and assaulting a police dog. Boston also had an active no bail warrant for a parole violation related to dangerous weapons /explosives. His bail is set at $196,000.
At 3:10 pm on Friday, the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office became aware of a stolen GM pickup truck out of Reedley. Deputies inside the sheriff’s helicopter, EAGLE One, spotted the stolen truck driving westbound in the area of Butler and De Wolf Avenues in Fresno. Deputies and Fresno Police officers in patrol cars were directed by the helicopter crew toward the suspect as he approached the area of Abby and Olive Avenues in Fresno. Deputies and officers attempted to pull him over but he avoided them, driving through neighborhoods and then getting onto eastbound Highway 180. Patrol cars stopped following him, but the helicopter continued to track him.
Boston exited at Clovis Avenue and drove southbound. At one point, he drove against traffic, but was able to avoid hitting anyone. Boston eventually took a route to the area of North and Del Rey Avenues in Sanger and drove into an orange orchard. Sheriff’s dispatchers learned the pickup was equipped with the safety feature OnStar, so they contacted the company to see if it had the ability to disable the vehicle. OnStar was able to remotely deactivate power to the engine, dropping the vehicle down to speeds of less than 5 mph. Crawling at approximately 1 mph, Boston continued to drive through a row of trees. Once he was about 100 feet into the row, deputies converged on his truck and fired a non-lethal combination of bean bag rounds and PepperBall in through the rear window. Boston still refused to give up, so Sheriff K-9 Ana was deployed. She jumped into the truck and bit Boston, causing him to surrender. At 4:00 pm, deputies took him into custody and turned him over to medics for treatment. Two deputies received minor cuts on their forearms from the broken glass. No motorists were injured.
