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Hostage drama sweeps up couple

They hitched a ride with Bobbie Miles and got more than they asked for as he hurtled toward a showdown with police.

By SAUNDRA AMRHEIN and DONG-PHUONG NGUYEN
Published February 3, 2005

TAMPA - The couple realized something was wrong when Bobbie Miles floored it.

He raced through red lights, drove off the road.

"Man, what the hell's going on?" asked Timothy Deese.

Deese was in the back seat of the Chrysler LeBaron with his girlfriend, Michelle Hutchins.

Up front, Miles was driving with his own girlfriend, Kimberly Hutchinson, at his side.

The four had just left Publix on Nebraska Avenue Tuesday night. The couple had hitched a ride there from Miles, someone they just met.

Events quickly spiraled out of control. A few hours later, Miles was dead, killed in a standoff with police. A hostage, a Tampa mom, survived being grazed by a bullet.

But in those first minutes, with cops in hot pursuit, Deese and Hutchins say their confusion turned to terror.

"Man, the car's stolen," Miles told them, as he punched the gas pedal. "The person the car belonged to is dead," he said. "I killed him."

The two couples met after Deese's brother Ray and his girlfriend, Diane Kirkpatrick, overheard two people at a Kmart counter, asking about cheap places to stay. It was Miles and Hutchinson, on the run from Jacksonville.

Kirkpatrick invited them back to the Orange Motel on Nebraska Avenue where they all were staying. The motel stretches across a pocked parking lot with about 20 attached one-story brick units fronted by idle men with bloodshot eyes and patio furniture with no cushions.

Miles, 27, and Hutchinson, 34, checked into unit No. 9, Kirkpatrick said. She and Ray Deese befriended the couple, but they had a bad feeling about Miles, she said.

"I didn't like the way he looked," she said.

Miles made them so nervous, Kirkpatrick said, that she and her boyfriend urged Timothy Deese and Hutchins not to get into the car with them Tuesday evening.

But Deese and Hutchins weren't going that far, they figured, just down the road to Publix to pick up some money at the Western Union, they later recalled.

Timothy Deese, 25, and Hutchins, 21, had drifted down from North Carolina on the promise of sunshine and construction work.

Miles struck them as "ready to pop off at any time," Deese said.

Miles' girlfriend, Hutchinson, seemed doped up, he said. Miles said they were from Jacksonville.

On Tuesday night, Deese and Hutchins offered Miles $5 in gas money to take them to Publix to get the money from Western Union, Deese said.

Once there, Hutchinson made two calls on the pay phone, one to her mom asking for money, and a second call to another person with whom she whispered, Hutchins said. Meanwhile, her mother was back on the phone, telling authorities where to find her daughter and Miles, Tampa police later said.

Unknown to Deese and Hutchins, Miles was a suspect in the murder of 20-year-old Don Blair in Jacksonville. Blair was shot outside a two-story brick apartment building early Monday, said Officer Ken Jefferson, spokesperson for the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office.

Miles also was wanted for a home invasion and armed robberies in north Florida, Tampa police said.

Shortly after the four piled back into the LeBaron and headed back toward the motel, a Tampa police officer spotted the car and started to tail it, Deese said.

Deese said they didn't know the unmarked car was the police until Miles made a few turns to see if he was being followed. That's when he started driving erratically, he said.

After Miles' confession, Deese and Hutchins began to holler: "Let me out!"

Shortly after 7 p.m., 26-year-old Sandra Soley was loading packages in her car at the Tampa Festival Centre shopping plaza on E Hillsborough Avenue near 22nd Street, with her two daughters, ages, 7 and 3, and the children, ages, 5, 2 and 1, of her friend Tanesha Walker of Tampa, Tampa police later said.

Walker was still in Citi Trends buying clothes, she said Wednesday.

Friends and neighbors of Soley say she has a knack for putting people at ease, that she's known for her love of cooking and a good dose of gossip.

"She always says hello," said William Lanier, who first befriended Soley when she moved in next door five years ago at the North Boulevard Homes on W Chestnut Street. "Everyone likes talking to her."

She made him macaroni and cheese and pork shoulder roast just last week.

Soley has been employed by the Hillsborough County School District as a substitute lunch room worker for about four months, school officials said.

Her girls are her life, neighbors said. And they were who she tried to protect as she saw what was coming at her.

The LeBaron sped into the Tampa Festival Centre plaza with police right behind. In the back seat, Deese and Hutchins thought for sure Miles would take them hostage.

As Miles steered to the far southeast corner of the lot, he spotted Soley. "Baby, I'm getting ready to hijack this woman," he told his girlfriend, Deese and Hutchins recalled.

"I'm getting sick. We're going to prison," Hutchinson replied, Deese and Hutchins said.

Before the LeBaron even stopped, Deese and Hutchins jumped out and ran toward the police, who told them to get down.

Hutchinson ran into the woods. Miles grabbed Soley and pushed her at gunpoint into the car she was loading, police said.

"Run, run, run!" Soley screamed to the children.

Walker, 24, ran out of the store, alerted by other shoppers to the chaos.

"Oh, my god, they are surrounding my car," Walker recalled saying. Within a few minutes, all five children came running from the car, released by Miles, Walker said. The police brought them all back into the store.

Officers threw Deese and Hutchins into separate police cars, the pair said. Hutchins told police that Hutchinson ran into the woods, and they began a search, later taking her into custody.

A 21/2-hour standoff began between Miles and members of the Tampa police SWAT and Hostage Negotiation Team.

SWAT members surrounded him, putting him in their sights while making sure no one would get hit in the cross-fire, Tampa police Chief Steve Hogue said.

Miles kept the gun at Soley's stomach, his finger off the trigger, Tampa police said. He demanded cigarettes, which SWAT brought him.

He wanted to talk to his girlfriend. He told police he'd already killed two people, that he wasn't going back to prison, where he'd been until October on a one-year sentence on a weapons charge.

Soley got on the phone with the girlfriend, too, begging her to ask Miles to let her go, Walker said.

After negotiators let him talk to his girlfriend once on the phone, he grew agitated and demanded to talk to her again, police said. He counted down from 30, and threatened to kill Soley.

Soley interrupted by talking to him, which angered Miles, Walker said Soley told her. He started counting again, but this time faster.

The SWAT team commander ordered the marksmen to set up their shots, Hogue said.

"You don't make the decision to shoot the suspect lightly," Hogue said later. "We felt that if we didn't stop him, he was going to kill the hostage."

Miles cocked the gun and jammed it into Soley's stomach, police said.

At 9:45 p.m., the snipers opened fire from 55 yards away, police said.

Two bullets hit Miles in the head and killed him. The third bullet grazed Soley's chest and arm, Hogue said. As Miles lay bleeding, Soley jumped out of the car and was led by police to a waiting ambulance. She was flown to Tampa General Hospital, but police said her wounds were not life threatening.

Capt. John Bennett, on the sniper team for 15 years; Cpl. Wayne Hutches, a 12-year veteran of the sniper team; and Cpl. Tommy Downes, a 20-year sniper team member, were all placed on paid administrative leave pending investigation of the shooting, said police spokeswoman Laura McElroy.

Hogue said his detectives were working with Jacksonville authorities and other agencies to discover if Miles had killed a second person. They also are tracking Miles' path to Tampa to find out what other crimes he might have committed along the way.

Hogue heard from his employees that Soley thanked the snipers for saving her life. As for Deese and Hutchins, they will not be charged with anything, he said.

Tampa police brought the couple and Hutchinson back to the Orange Motel late Tuesday night or Wednesday morning, they said. Hutchinson, who Tampa detectives said was a prostitute who Miles had pledged to keep off the streets, was distraught about his death, Deese and Hutchins said.

"They killed the love of my life," she kept saying to them.

Hutchinson was brought back home Wednesday morning by Jacksonville police, Hutchins said.

Before she left, she said she wanted to hang out in their room, where they lay on their bed Wednesday afternoon, still in shock.

Hutchins told her no. "I'm not ready for any more drama."

Times researchers Cathy Wos and John Martin contributed.

[Last modified February 3, 2005, 04:32:15]