Fla. man steals ambulance service vehicle, arrested days later while trying to flee police

An AMR supervisor rolled down his window to ask if a man standing in the road was OK; the man “began throwing himself at the window, gaining access to the ambulance”

March 28, 2024 01:05 PM

By Emily Wunderlich
Tampa Bay Times

TAMPA, Fla. — A Lakeland man has been arrested after police say he stole an ambulance service vehicle early Friday morning in Tampa.

Hillsborough deputies found Gregorey Brian McGall, 36, in a silver Nissan Altima near State Road 60 and County Line Road on Monday, the sheriff’s office said in a news release. The car was being driven by another man who had active warrants, and both were arrested and taken to the Hillsborough County jail.

McGall is facing several charges, including grand theft of a motor vehicle, carjacking and aggravated assault. He was being held at the Falkenburg Road Jail without bond on Tuesday.

At about 2 a.m. Friday, a supervisor with American Medical Rescue, a private ambulance service, came across a pickup truck that crashed on the southbound Interstate 75 exit ramp to westbound Interstate 4 in Hillsborough County, the Florida Highway Patrol said in a news release. The pickup truck was later determined to be stolen.

The supervisor, who was driving a Chevy Tahoe marked as a rescue vehicle, found a man standing in the roadway, so he rolled down his window to ask if everything was OK, the news release states. The man — later identified as McGall — approached the ambulance and “began throwing himself at the window, gaining access to the ambulance,” the news release states.

Once he was inside, troopers say McGall fought with the ambulance service employee and took control of the vehicle. Fearing for his life, the driver got out and called 911. He was not hurt, according to the news release.

As he fled in the stolen vehicle, McGall collided with a Nissan Altima farther along the exit ramp. Deputies with the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office spotted the ambulance service vehicle on Martin Luther King Jr . Boulevard and initiated a chase, but terminated it after losing sight of it.

Shortly afterward, a camera system inside the vehicle reported a crash at 2:09 a.m. and took a photo of the man inside. The vehicle was found crashed in a fenced-in grass lot at 3720 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., and the suspect had fled the scene, troopers say. The Florida Highway Patrol had sought the public’s help in identifying the man.

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