Captured in Onset, Cape Cod...
http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100522/NEWS11/100529923
Motor vehicle homicide suspect captured in Onset
ONSET — She eluded police for more than a day, but officers — with the help of a police dog — captured 18-year-old Gina Giovangelo near a wooded area this afternoon.
Giovangelo is facing motor vehicle homicide charges after she allegedly failed to stop after striking Lillian White, 47, Tuesday night in Hyannis. White, who was in a wheelchair when she was hit, died several hours later.
The police arrested Giovangelo, who lives at 73 Vandermint Lane, after they questioned her Thursday evening — two nights after the crash. She was released on $10,000 cash bail and ordered to appear in Barnstable District Court Friday morning for her arraignment.
But shortly after she entered court yesterday morning, Giovangelo left to go outside to have a cigarette and never returned.
Barnstable District Court Judge Don Carpenter issued a warrant for her arrest.
Police canvassed the Cape for more than a day, chasing a number of leads from people who reported seeing her.
A woman who lives in the Fairway Drive and Roberta Drive in Onset said she saw police capture Giovangelo this afternoon.
“She was alone at the time,” said the woman, who asked not to be named. “They got her by using a police dog and chasing her in the woods.”
Investigators had identified Giovangelo’s vehicle, a 2007 Nissan Altima, through surveillance footage at the Holly Tree Resort Hotel on Route 28 in West Yarmouth, where she had been seen before and after the crash, according to a police report.
And several acquaintances, including at least one who described herself as a passenger in the vehicle, identified Giovangelo as the driver, Barnstable police Detective Sgt. John F. Murphy wrote in the report.
Giovangelo, who faces charges of motor-vehicle homicide as well as leaving the scene of an accident, will be arraigned on the homicide charges when she is found and taken into custody, Assistant District Attorney Brian Glenny said.
The amount of bail prosecutors seek will depend on the circumstances of her flight. The motor-vehicle homicide charge is punishable by up to 30 years in jail, a $3,000 fine and a 10-year driver’s license revocation, according to court documents.
Giovangelo, who had her license suspended last month, was on probation at the time of her arrest stemming from a larceny charge, according to court records. In the larceny case, she was put on one year’s probation and required to spend 30 days at the Emerson House, a drug treatment facility for women in Falmouth.
The larceny charge stemmed from a January incident in which police allegedly found Giovangelo and two other women stole more than $740 worth of jewelry from the Plum Porch, a Marstons Mills gift shop.