KANSAS CITY, Mo. (WDAF) - It's one of the slowest pursuits you'll ever see.
A Vespa moped with less than a 50cc engine went through neighborhoods, down major roads and through multiple parks in Clay County, Missouri.
It started simply enough, two men on a moped ran an Avondale stop sign just before midnight Sunday night.
"They assumed they were just going to pull them over ... write them a citation something like that," Sarah Boyd, Clay County Sheriff's public relations manager, said.
Audio from the deputy's dashcam demonstrates the deputy's disbelief, "Red scooter, two white males. I don't know if he's going to stop actually," the deputy said.
But soon the Clay County deputy would figure out the men weren't stopping and were attempting to outrun them.
The deputy kept fellow law enforcement up to date on the pursuit, "He's still going east on Cates, speeds are up to 21 miles per hour," he said.
Both men on the hill were a little too much for the Vespa, as they had to put the "ped" in moped by running it with their feet before one man gave up and made a run for it.
The passenger was never found.
"Passenger just hopped off, going Westbound between houses," the deputy said.
Five minutes into the chase and with plenty of sirens blaring, the driver headed into a park with the deputy off-roading behind him. He then went down a narrow path into a neighborhood where he may have been before.
"Oh my goodness, that's hilarious. He should have just got off and walked. He might have gotten just as far down the road," Todd Hurd said.
Hurd knows how fast the Vespa can go because it's his. It hadn't been running well last month when video showed a thief taking it from his driveway.
That's the park where the driver may have thought he was going to get away when the deputy took some time to jump the curb. But he quickly caught up as the driver headed into backyards. Finally about 10 minutes after it began, the 41-year-old driver crashed.
"And he's bailing," the deputy said as pieces of the moped littered the road.
He was apprehended in the backyard but wasn't charged in the pursuit.
"Ultimately, the speeds did not raise to the limit of being able to charge him for the pursuit because it wasn't fast enough," Boyd explained.
But he still could face charges for resisting arrest and drug paraphernalia found in the Vespa's compartment.
"It's pretty funny that he tried to run the cops on it. He's going to have to tell his cellmates, 'Yeah, I was running from the cops on a moped,'" Hurd laughed.
The man wasn't in jail Tuesday night. In fact, he was back in the same park where he led deputies in the pursuit Sunday. He declined an interview, saying he didn't want his face on camera and rode away on a bicycle.
The owner said he was happy to see the Vespa and learn it had been recovered, albeit wrecked. But right now, he'd have to pay $550 to get it out of the tow lot, which is probably more than it's worth.
