By Daniella Segura
The Charlotte Observer
GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. — A man is accused of intentionally driving his truck through a Colorado police department’s lobby “in order to be heard,” police said.
Nathan Chacon, 45, plowed his 2007 Chevrolet Silverado into the lobby of the Grand Junction Police Department on Wednesday, Jan. 25, causing more than $100,000 in damages, according to a news release from the police department and an arrest affidavit.
“When I arrived in the lobby, I was completely shocked and taken aback by the state of the lobby,” an officer wrote in the affidavit.
Surveillance video shared by the department shows the truck smashing through “two sets of metal doors with bulletproof window panes” of the lobby before being stopped by a retaining wall, police said.
“Miraculously this wall stopped Nathan’s truck and did not allow it to go any further into the offices,” according to the affidavit.
The 11 employees working in the building at the time were not harmed, according to police.
“Luckily no one had been utilizing the benches or was in the lobby at the time of this crash, which would be normal activity on a weekday around 12:30,” the affidavit said.
Chacon was arrested and is facing a number of charges, including attempted murder, attempted assault, attempted vehicular homicide-reckless driving and reckless endangerment, according to police.
Chacon told officers he believed he was “being followed by several cars” after he left his home, police said, and that “he became paranoid of these vehicles and began making erratic turns and turning down side streets in order to avoid these vehicles.”
Fearing he would be harmed or killed, he decided to plow into the lobby with his car, Chacon is accused of telling officers.
Chacon reportedly told police “he knew it was dumb but he knew what he needed to do in order to be heard.”
Over the last few years, Chacon has made “at least 90 calls for service … where he is reporting strange happenings that have been unfounded,” police said.
“Some of these calls for service in the recent days leading up to this event insinuate a pattern that Nathan was becoming frustrated with deputies as he would hang up on them and swear at them over the phone,” the affidavit said.
Grand Junction is about 240 miles southwest of Denver, near the Colorado- Utah border.
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