Thief At Center Of FBI-Involved Shooting Surrenders
(CBS) -- A man who has been on the lam since Monday, after he was shot by an FBI agent during a chase, turned himself in to the feds on Thursday.
CBS 2's Mike Parker was there as the man surrendered to the FBI.
For three days, William Tapes was an FBI fugitive, walking the streets and sleeping on CTA trains and buses, he says.
"I was scared, you know, for my life. That's why I hid," Tapes told CBS 2's Mike Parker Thursday afternoon. "I just got tired."
Tapes, along with friends and relatives and a West side pastor, came to the FBI's Chicago headquarters to surrender.
The pastor, Rev. Michael Stinson, prayed with Tapes before the wanted man went inside.
Tapes was at the center of an FBI-involved shooting Monday afternoon, and a car chase that preceded it.
Here is his explanation: He stole two hubcaps in a Jewel Osco parking lot on the Near West Side. He says he panicked when someone took a cell-phone photo of him and, along with another man, tried to block his car. They were apparently FBI agents, although Tapes says they did not identify themselves.
"I swerved around them and I just took off," Tapes says.
As he drove off, it is believed one of the agents opened fire on the car, hitting Tapes in the wrist and more seriously wounding Tapes' passenger. Several blocks away at Flournoy and Paulina, Tapes' bullet-riddled car slammed into another vehicle and injured two people.
Tapes fled and went into hiding.
Moments before surrendering Thursday, Tapes told CBS 2 he knows he may end up being charged with a crime. "I got to deal with the consequence," he said.
Inside the FBI building, Tapes was taken into custody and promised medical care for his untreated wound. He may be in federal court for a hearing on Friday. At that hearing, charges are expected to be announced.
Tapes says he is praying for the people he injured in that accident as he fled.
"I didn't try to hit that car, I just panicked and blacked out," he said.
