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LARGO - P.J. Brown heard what sounded like two gunshots Friday afternoon. Then he looked up and saw what looked like an action movie.
A white utility truck pulling a boat on a trailer barrelled past his grandmother's house on 131st Street N in Largo. The trailer was partially on top of a Pinellas sheriff's deputy's car, which was being dragged along at what Brown estimated was 50 mph.
Brown, 12, saw that the deputy inside the cruiser had pulled his gun.
"Half of the boat trailer was on top of the cop car," Brown said later.
He said the truck went out of his view as a deputy in another car pulled up with his gun drawn. Brown heard three more shots and heard the utility truck blast through the mailbox of his home next door, then slam head-first into a tree.
Deputies ordered the driver of the utility truck to get out, but witnesses said he refused. Deputies, including several more who drove up on the scene, pulled the driver out of the truck's passenger side and cuffed him on the ground.
Deputies said the driver, Anthony Dinaso, 27, of Largo, had been hit by a bullet once in the side. He was taken by helicopter to Bayfront Medical Center and was listed in stable condition Friday evening.
Sheriff's officials said two deputies shot at him: Cpl. Christopher Taylor, a six-year veteran, and Economic Crimes Detective Michael Nawrocki, a 16-year veteran. They were not hurt. Both were placed on paid administrative leave, which is routine after a shooting involving a deputy.
Sheriff's officials said the utility truck, the boat and the trailer all had been reported stolen. Deputies tried to pull the truck over when they spotted it in the area of 131st Street N and 102nd Avenue in Largo, just south of Walsingham Road.
The boat had been reported stolen the day before in Largo, and the boat owner's father saw it about 1:30 p.m. Friday in that area. He phoned the Sheriff's Office while following the boat around the area.
Nawrocki, who was working patrol Friday, caught up with the boat, as did Taylor, a training deputy who was on his way home from work.
Officials said Dinaso didn't stop as the deputies - Taylor in a marked cruiser, Nawrocki in an unmarked car - gave pursuit. Dinaso then swerved into the marked cruiser, running it over and tangling it under the trailer. The car then was dragged more than 10 blocks.
"He swerved, trying to cut the deputy off," said Mac McMullen, a sheriff's office spokesman. "The suspect accelerated, starting to drag the deputy."
The pursuit ended near 116th Street when Dinaso slammed into the tree. The boat, a 25-foot Larson pleasure vessel, was tossed from the trailer.
Investigators were still trying to determine late Friday if Dinaso fired at deputies.
Brown reported seeing several bullet holes in the windshield of the marked cruiser, including one that looked as if it had been fired into the car. When deputies pulled Dinaso out of the car, he was wearing a holster. Deputies found a revolver on the floor of the truck. The gun was in a cocked position, sheriff's officials said.
Brown said pieces of the trailer also were lodged in the car hood, while marks from the trailer wheel were smeared on the car. The boat's anchor at some point flew off.
The seventh-grader said he could understand why the deputy would have feared for his life and felt the need to shoot.
"I would not want a trailer on top of me," he said.
Brown said there were two pedestrians in front of his house as the events unfolded. They took cover behind an RV his family has for sale in the front yard.
Witnesses said even when deputies got the wounded driver out of the truck, he continued to struggle with them. "He was still trying to fight the cops," Brown said.
His mother, Nancy George, said the truck caught on fire after it hit the tree. A deputy grabbed a fire extinguisher and put it out, she said.
"He hit it pretty hard head-on," George said.
She was surprised by such a violent encounter in her neighborhood.
"We're usually a pretty quiet lot," she said.
The utility truck belonged to Peoples Gas in Tampa and was stolen April 8, said Peoples Gas spokesman Lance Horton.
He said the gas company reported the theft to Tampa police. Until Friday's shooting, he had heard nothing about its whereabouts.
However, Pinellas sheriff's officials said a Florida Highway Patrol trooper in Hillsborough County encountered the stolen truck Monday. The trooper pulled it over, but the driver backed the truck into the trooper's car, causing serious damage. The truck then drove off and got away.
Sheriff's officials said the stolen truck was pulling a trailer and boat that day, which the trooper later found abandoned up the road.
Investigators don't know if Dinaso was driving the stolen truck that day, but records show he has had plenty of problems with the law before.
In fact, six years ago he was involved in an incident very similar to what happened Friday.
On Dec. 15, 1998, a Hillsborough sheriff's deputy spotted Dinaso driving a stolen motorcycle on N Dale Mabry Highway. The deputy flashed his lights and tried to pull Dinaso over, but he made an obscene gesture, accelerated into an intersection and crashed into a pickup.
Dinaso was taken to the hospital, but later released and charged with grand theft and fleeing police. Hillsborough authorities charged him with 13 other crimes that year, including cocaine possession, grand theft of a firearm, sale of marijuana and grand theft auto.
He was sentenced to two years and six months in prison in connection with all those crimes. He was released in February 2001.
Dinaso also has been in trouble in Pinellas County, including a 1998 arrest on racketeering charges. Records show Dinaso was serving probation for those charges, which he had recently violated. A warrant for his arrest on a probation of violation charge had been issued April 15, records show.
As for Friday's incident, Dinaso will face charges including attempted murder of a deputy, sheriff's officials said.
- Chris Tisch can be reached at 445-4156 or tisch@sptimes.com Staff writer Shannon Colavecchio-Van Sickler, photographer Kinfay Moroti and researcher Jenny Lichtenwalner contributed to this report.