Last Stop: Tonopah Arizona

I'm still a little shaken up.

I helped Stephen move a television and it's stand downstairs today and though the chore was simplicity itself he insisted on buying me lunch out of gratitude.  

Neither of us really expected what happened next.

Cut to the Chase

There were people in the dining room and none at the bar so we went to the bar.  It was early afternoon and we were catching the shift change between folks who got an early start and were heading out and folks who had worked an early shift and were heading in.  

I had a tuna sub and Stephen had a cheeseburger that made me wish I'd ordered a cheeseburger.  The waitress sat our second round in front of us and we hardly noticed.  There was a car chase on television.  Someone behind me asked if it were O.J. Simpson up to his old tricks again and those of us who remembered that laughed.  

Facts were few and far between.  Someone had stolen a car, fired shots at the police, and was now heading like a bat out of hell out of Arizona.  One newscaster commented on his poor choice of automobile.  Another said the speed of the stolen vehicle was averaging at one hundred miles an hour.  They speculated he was heading to California.

In the interim there were brief clips of fighting in Syria.  Election coverage.  Commercials for prescription medications.  

Stephen and I wondered what was going through this guys mind.  What was his plan?  We said that it was hardly worth the name "car chase" as it was really just the stolen car weaving around traffic on a desert highway.  I excused myself to the restroom and joked that while I was in the can the whole thing would come to a spectacular end and I'd miss it.

When I returned the car had made an unexpected move.  He'd made a u-turn and was now heading down a dirt road.  Again I marveled at what this person must be thinking.  

Just go.  Don't stop.  Keep driving.  Don't let them get you.

The driver passed what looked like two farms, both out in the middle of nowhere.  So far the most exciting part had been the u-turn and now he made a right at stop sign.  I wondered when the helicopter providing the footage would lose it's signal or some producer would call it a lost cause and switch to something else.

And then it happened.

The car stopped and the driver emerged.  I couldn't see much of him, just that he wore an oversize jersey and jeans.  He spent time in the back seat of the car and for a moment I thought maybe there was someone else in the car.  Maybe the person he'd stolen the car from.  They had said all along he'd fired shots at police, so I don't know why I was surprised that he had a gun.  He ran down the dirt road, falling once and rolling in the dust, and took cover behind a bush.  I thought he was planning to shoot it out with the police, but as it turns out, he had another idea. 

He turned the gun on himself and pulled the trigger.  His head moved just slightly, like he'd been pushed.  There was, of course, no sound and as he fell forward they cut away.  Cut to a commercial. 

I'm sure we've all watched clips of horrific happenings and laughed, but in those circumstances you could always tell yourself it wasn't real.  You'd question whether or not it was doctored.  If it got too gross you'd just click it away.  But I saw this over lunch with my friend and I can't shake it.  I can't shake the sheer desperation that he must have felt.  I hated myself for the morbid curiosity that kept me watching.  My God, was this what I wanted to see all along?  

Like this desperate criminal, I just couldn't get away.        

I've been rooting around online and so far the only headline is that there was a televised suicide, the network is being criticized for allowing it out over the air, and one site in particular criticized the footage for being too blurry, can you believe that? 

But I want to know this man's name.