SAN ANTONIO – Anthony Ross was planning to buy a lottery ticket when he pulled into a Far West Side gas station on Feb. 5.
But it did not turn out to be his lucky day. Instead, Ross ended up getting his 2012 Chevrolet Avalanche stolen at gunpoint and then damaged in his carjacker’s ensuing police chase.
As he parked outside the QuikTrip on Hunt Lane and Highway 151, Ross said a man he took to be a panhandler walked up, knocked on his window, and gestured at him.
“I’m looking at the guy, and he’s knocking on the window,” Ross recounted to KSAT recently, standing just a few feet from the parking spot where it happened.
Thinking he would give the man a few dollars, Ross said he got out of his truck.
“He steps close to me, and I was like, ‘What’s up?’ He asked me was I a Christian? And I didn’t know what he meant by that. So I just said ‘no.’ And then he said, ‘Well, I’m going to take your car then. Give me your keys,’” Ross recalled.
The man’s hand was wrapped around something that Ross believed could be a gun.
“And so I said, ‘What’s that?’ Because he was pointing something in my midsection. I said, ‘Is that a gun?’ He said, ‘Yeah.’ So I went in my pocket and gave him my car keys.”
As Ross watched the carjacker reverse his truck out of the parking and drive calmly away, the experience seemed surreal.
“I’m a retired Chicago firefighter, and I moved from Chicago to get away from carjackers,” he chuckled.
Though Ross said he had his gun on him, he decided not to use it. And despite what he told his carjacker about his beliefs, Ross quoted the Bible in explaining why not.
“It didn’t have nothing to do with me. It’s just, you know, God said, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ So I’m not going to kill you. He said, ‘If a man take your coat, give him your cloak also,’” Ross said.
CHASE, TASER, CHARGES
SAPD said Ross’s carjacker that night was Jonathan Casas, 27, whom they spotted in the stolen Avalanche later that night.
But when an officer tried to pull Casas over, he hit the gas, according to the police report.
SAPD chased him for about 20 minutes, police said before it ended near Culebra and Navidad.
According to the report, police purposely hit the stolen pickup in an attempt to get it to stop - a tactic known as a pursuit immobilization technique (PIT).
After the PIT maneuver ended the chase, police said Casas “became uncompliant and was reaching into his pockets.” An officer then shocked Casas with a Taser.
According to the report, Casas confessed to carjacking Ross as well as having tried to carjack another woman at the QuikTrip first. SAPD says the woman had been able to push Casas away, at which point he ran away and approached Ross.
Police brought both Ross and the woman to the crash scene to try to identify Casas. Though police said Ross was “unable to verify” Casas as his carjacker fully, the woman was.
Casas also admitted to having earlier run away from a crash involving a different stolen car just a block from the QuikTrip. Police said they also found the keys to that vehicle in Ross’s stolen car.
Casas was booked on four felony charges: aggravated robbery, robbery, evading arrest or detention in a vehicle, and unauthorized use of a vehicle. He remains in the Bexar County Jail.
Ross said the damage to his Avalanche — on which he had just one remaining payment — was extensive. He said the front end, driver’s side, and back were all banged up, and both airbags deployed.
“The irony is they’re charging me a deductible for getting carjacked,” he said of his insurance company.
MORE CAR THEFTS, FEWER CARJACKINGS
While San Antonio Police statistics showed a skyrocketing number of car thefts in 2023, carjackings were actually down compared to the year before.
An SAPD crime statistics presentation in January showed a 53% spike in motor vehicle thefts — 19,225 in 2023 compared to 12,551 in 2022 — driving a smaller bump in overall crime.
The skyrocketing theft numbers were due in part to a social media trend that showed people how to break into a faulty ignition system in KIAs and Hyundais. Various KIA and Hyundai models and some popular full-sized pickup trucks made up more than half of the year’s car thefts.
Meanwhile, carjackings, which most often happen at gunpoint, get tallied as robberies and happen much less frequently.
According to statistics SAPD provided Monday, only 322 reported carjackings or attempted carjackings in 2023 - a 12% drop from the 367 in 2022.
However, in January, the crime is up slightly compared to previous years. The department’s statistics show 36 reported carjackings last month compared to the 28 reported in either January 2022 or January 2023.
Ross said his experience in San Antonio hasn’t made him less safe.
“This is a one-off. It just happens,” he said. “But, you know, it’s unfortunate. You know, I hope that the young man get(s) some help.”