{"id":63416,"date":"2019-03-21T21:46:27","date_gmt":"2019-03-22T03:46:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/man-gets-prison-time-for-leading-police-on-chase\/"},"modified":"2019-03-22T03:46:27","modified_gmt":"2019-03-22T03:46:27","slug":"man-gets-prison-time-for-leading-police-on-chase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/man-gets-prison-time-for-leading-police-on-chase\/","title":{"rendered":"Man gets prison time for leading police on chase"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Ahkee\"
Ahkee<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A New Mexico man who led law enforcement on a chase through central La Plata County in a stolen vehicle from the Navajo Nation was sentenced Thursday to two years in prison.<\/p>\n

Michael Ahkee, 21, pleaded guilty to one count of vehicular eluding in February for leading the La Plata County Sheriff\u2019s Office on a 90 mph chase Dec. 30 on U.S. Highway 160 west of Durango. Law enforcement deployed spike strips and used tactical vehicle intervention, also known as a PIT maneuverer, to stop the vehicle.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis case shows no respect to the authority of the law,\u201d District Court Judge Suzanne Carlson said at a sentencing hearing Thursday. \u201cThe victim in this case is the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

La Plata County Sheriff\u2019s deputies arrested Ahkee for vehicular eluding and aggravated motor vehicle theft, both Class 5 felonies. Prosecutors charged Ahkee with four counts, including vehicular eluding, aggravated motor theft and two counts of habitual criminal sentencing enhancers. Habitual criminal sentencing enhancers are for people who have been convicted of three or more felony offenses.<\/p>\n

Ahkee pleaded guilty to one count of vehicular eluding, a Class 5 felony punishable by one to three years in prison followed by a mandatory parole period of two years.<\/p>\n

Ahkee did not address the court Thursday.<\/p>\n

Heather Little, a public defender representing Ahkee, said her client recognizes what he did was dangerous, and said he wouldn\u2019t be in the position he is if it weren\u2019t for his methamphetamine addiction.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s looking at incarceration for a non-insignificant amount of time,\u201d Little said. \u201cHis future will require him to find new interests and new hobbies.\u201d<\/p>\n

While being led out of the courtroom by sheriff\u2019s deputies, Ahkee turned to his family in the gallery, held up two fingers and mouthed \u201cI love you.\u201d<\/p>\n

bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

An earlier version of this story gave an incorrect name of the defense attorney representing Michael Ahkee.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

21-year-old eluded law enforcement, driving at speeds of 90 mph<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":63417,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[133,28,867,29,4259],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-63416","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-courts","tag-headlines","tag-la-plata-county-courthouse","tag-newsletter","tag-newsletter-sign-up"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63416\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63416"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=63416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}