Miami Gardens police are searching for a 24-year-old woman who, officers say, stole a pickup truck during a dealership test drive on Wednesday, led Florida Highway Patrol troopers on a chase along the Palmetto Expressway, was caught and taken to hospital — and then walked out of that hospital hours later while the troopers guarding her were pulled away to deal with a separate armed patient.

Source: Miami Focal (Focal News), reporting Miami Gardens Police

The woman, identified by police as Daniela Aguirre, 24, remained at large on Thursday, November 12, according to Miami Gardens police. The Florida Highway Patrol (FHP) also confirmed the sequence — a stolen pickup, an arrest, and then an escape from Jackson North Medical Center — in its account carried by WSVN 7News. Every charge described in this report is an allegation: Aguirre has not been convicted in this case and is presumed innocent unless prosecutors prove guilt in court.

Source: WSVN 7News via Spot On Florida

It began with a test drive that never came back

The episode began at 12:48 p.m. on Wednesday, November 11, when officers responded to the 5500 block of the Northwest 826 exit ramp at 163rd Street in Miami Gardens, Miami-Dade County, where a vehicle had been taken from a dealership for a test drive and never returned, police said. Police have not named the dealership, and they have not said whether the truck taken on Wednesday was connected to any particular dealership beyond that report.

The truck was later spotted heading east on the Palmetto Expressway — State Road 826 — near the Northwest 57th Avenue exit, prompting a pursuit by Florida Highway Patrol troopers together with local police, according to the police account. State Road 826, the Palmetto Expressway, is one of Miami-Dade County's busiest expressways, carrying commuter and freight traffic across the county, so a midday pursuit on it unfolded in front of ordinary Wednesday traffic.

Caught, taken to hospital — then gone

Aguirre was eventually detained after the chase and taken to Jackson North Medical Center to be treated for injuries that authorities have not described, police said. Hours later, the case took its unusual turn: another patient at the hospital, who was armed, fired a weapon inside the facility, police said. The troopers assigned to guard Aguirre left her room to respond to that threat.

When the troopers returned, the room was empty. “She was no longer in the room and had fled the hospital,” police said. Officers set up a perimeter around the hospital but were unable to locate her. Police have not released further details about the armed-patient incident, about the injuries Aguirre was being treated for, or about how she left the building.

Police say it was not her first test-drive arrest this year

The Wednesday chase echoes an earlier arrest this year, authorities said. Aguirre was previously taken into custody after she allegedly stole a Dodge Ram pickup from a Miami-Dade County dealership during a test drive — arriving at that dealership, according to an arrest report, in a Ford Fusion that had itself been reported stolen. In that earlier case she was booked on two counts of grand theft of a vehicle and given an alternate bond of $2,500 on each count, the report said. Those earlier allegations are also unproven charges, separate from this week's case.

What happens next

The search is now the story. Miami Gardens police are asking the public for help finding Aguirre, and anyone who knows where she is can contact the department or Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers. Police have not announced a full list of new charges arising from Wednesday's alleged theft, the expressway pursuit and the hospital escape, and they have not said whether the armed-patient incident at Jackson North is connected to her escape in any way beyond drawing her guards away. This report will be updated when police announce an arrest or formal charges.

For drivers and dealerships along the State Road 826 corridor, the case is a reminder of two familiar South Florida problems at once: test-drive thefts, in which a vehicle handed over for a short drive simply does not come back, and the strain on officers who must guard arrest patients inside busy hospitals. On Wednesday, police say, both problems landed on the same shift — and ended with the suspect back on the street.