College student shot, killed by police after wild car crashes

Police fatally shot a young college student from Maryland after she drove her car on a chaotic, dangerous dash through crowded South Beach streets early Sunday evening.

The black BMW sedan driven by 22-year-old Cariann Hithon, a student at Temple University in Philadelphia, careened into three separate incidents in the space of a few blocks, eventually striking an officer:

▪  Police said she sped into oncoming traffic on Ocean Drive just past 6 p.m., smashing into two cars in full view of horrified sidewalk diners enjoying the long Columbus Day weekend.

▪ She then blew through a red light on 12th Street at Collins Avenue, plowing into a Mercedes-Benz driven by a retired county homicide detective — missing a direct hit on his passenger by just a few feet.

▪ Finally, police said, her car accelerated into a crowd that rushed in, hitting a Miami Beach officer and spurring another cop to open fire on the BMW.

“It played out like a movie set with people running, screaming, car crashes, gun shots, an injured officer lying on his back on the road – all within a minute,” said the retired Miami-Dade homicide detective, John Butchko.

Before those five minutes of chaos, the driver was just another Miami Beach tourist.

The Bowie, MD native was in town to celebrate her 22nd birthday, said her father, Cary Hithon, a trip she’d been planning for months. Authorities believe she had been drinking heavily earlier in the day. A passenger riding with Hithon was being held for questioning, according to Miami-Dade police.

The injured Miami Beach officer is David Cajuso, who joined the force in September 2015. He was released from the hospital early Monday and is recovering at home, a department spokesman said.

Butchko and his passenger, Miami Beach lawyer, Sean Ellsworth, suffered minor injuries. The two had just left the hospital while visiting George Cholakis, a former prosecutor who died earlier Sunday of an apparent heart attack.

Miami Beach police have not identified the officer who opened fire on Hithon. Ellsworth told the Miami Herald that after the crash, the woman in the BMW “put the pedal to the metal” when she drove into the crowd and hit the officer.

Butchko said the woman was going at least 60 miles at full speed before hitting the front passenger side of his Mercedes. “We clearly had a green light. Two cars had already gone through the intersection,” Butchko said.

Hithon’s father said she’d recently transferred to Temple University and expected to graduate with a degree in political science this spring. After that, she planned to follow her longstanding dream of attending law school.

“She was going to be the attorney to save the world,” said Hithon, a retired U.S. Navy captain. “Everybody that knew her knew she had a great future.”

Her friends, family and church community are mourning the 22-year-old, who excelled in school and attended several summer leadership institutes. She was a talented baker and makeup artist, Hithon said, the one all her friends and sisters tapped to help on special occasions.

She had a few brushes with the law over the past year in Hampton, according to court records, including arrests for marijuana possession, giving a fake ID to an officer and assault and battery. She was not convicted of any of the charges, although she was convicted on a citation of improper driving.

Late Sunday, Miami Beach Police Chief Daniel Oates told reporters there were more officers than usual patrolling the Miami Beach’s entertainment district, which was busier with tourists because of the Columbus Day holiday.

Shooting at a moving vehicle was once completely prohibited by Beach police department police, an approach adopted by Oates when he arrived in 2014. Oates’ 2014 directive followed a wild melee on Memorial Day weekend that bears some similarities with Sunday’s incident. Raymond Herisse, a tourist in town for the weekend’s parties, was killed on in a hail of bullets from multiple police officers.

Cops targeted 116 rounds at Herrisse’s car after police say he sideswiped a number of cars and hit a patrol officer on a bicycle. But one exception was added to the policy in five months ago — when a vehicle threatens to ram into a crowd. The policy was updated following terrorist vehicle attacks in Europe.

Counterparts at Miami-Dade police are investigating the officer-involved shooting. Prosecutors will ultimately decide if the firing officer broke any laws in using deadly force. Under Florida’s “fleeing felon” law, police can open fire on someone suspected of committing a felony and who could pose a threat to the public.

In a statement, Miami Beach’s police union lamented the the woman’s death but said “we cannot dismiss the fact that an officer was hit with deadly force by a vehicle that was driving recklessly and fleeing from the scene of an accident.”

Her dad said he had “a lot of questions” about what exactly happened the night Cariann was killed, but he wouldn't speculate without more information.

“She liked to drive fast, but what young person doesn't drive fast?” he said.

Cariann was a champion for the undeserved, Hithon said. His last conversation with his daughter was about the controversy over NFL players kneeling during the national anthem and police brutality in the United States.

“It's kind of ironic she was killed by a police officer,” he said. “To end her life this way is obviously very devastating.”

This story was originally published October 10, 2017 at 7:37 AM with the headline "College student shot, killed by police after wild car crashes."