ADAMS COUNTY, Colo. — A Lochbuie man who pleaded guilty to hitting an Adams County deputy with his vehicle while he was evading law enforcement has been sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Cesar Irreza, 30, pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree murder and vehicular eluding with injury on April 31. The 17th Judicial District Attorney’s Office announced his sentence in a news release that was distributed Friday.
Irreza is accused of hitting the deputy on April 2, 2020.
Prosecutors said deputies first encountered him after they were called to the area of East 148th Avenue and Lanewood Street for a report of a possible home invasion. That’s when they encountered Irreza, who was driving a white Cadillac.
Irreza drove away, prosecutors said, leading deputies on a pursuit where speeds reached upwards of 100 mph.
Prosecutors said he rammed into a Jeep Renegade when he reached the intersection of Tower Road and East 120th Avenue, and continued forward, hitting a deputy who was standing in the shoulder with stop sticks.
“I’ve never been so close to being killed,” the deputy told his colleagues on the scene, according to prosecutors.
Irreza was taken into custody a short time later. While he was not a suspect in the initial call for a home invasion, prosecutors said he did have a warrant for his arrest for escaping a halfway house.
A woman who was a passenger in his Cadillac was also taken into custody.
The deputy was taken to the hospital, but did not have life-threatening injuries.
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