Stolen Car Rams Police Car During Chase Through Ramapo Campus: Mahwah Cops

MAHWAH, NJ — A police pursuit followed the driver of a stolen vehicle onto the campus of Ramapo College on Thursday, and officers continued to chase him down after he then fled the campus and struck a police car, Mahwah Detective Capt. Guido Bussinelli said.

The driver of the stolen vehicle, Kayden Carter-Cook, and the passenger, Samoray Sutton, led authorities on a chase that started on Campgaw Road and ended at the intersection of Route 202 and Continental Soldiers Park, Bussinelli said.

Carter-Cook and Sutton were ultimately taken into custody and charged with multiple offenses, including those related to the theft of mail from residential mailboxes in Mahwah; Goshen, New York, and several towns in Vermont.

Police first responded to a report of a suspicious vehicle, a 2021 Honda Civic, in the area of the Rio Vista community at 11:17 a.m., and determined that the Civic was reported stolen a day earlier by New York police.

Officers tried to stop the vehicle on Campgaw, yet the driver, Carter-Cook, refused to stop and fled northbound toward Ramapo, where he then continued through the south entrance of the college, while being pursued by several officers. He then drove back out onto Route 202, where he hit the police car, and then continued south before coming to a rest near the park.

The passenger, Sutton, fled and was quickly apprehended after a short foot pursuit, and Carter-Cook remained in the vehicle and was also apprehended. An investigation revealed the defendants had used the stolen vehicle to commit additional thefts, specifically stealing mail.

Carter-Cook, 23, and Suffern, 26; were charged with eluding a law enforcement officer in the second degree; trafficking in personal identifying information over 50 items in the second degree; wrongful impersonating; obtaining and using another's ID in the second degree; theft by unlawful taking in the third degree; receiving stolen property in the third degree; and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in the third degree.

The defendants, both of New York, were subsequently taken to the Bergen County Jail pending their first court appearance.