NORTHWEST MIAMI-DADE, FLA. (WSVN) - A mother and her five children spoke out about a home invasion after a handcuffed man escaped from a police cruiser and nearly broke into their home in Northwest Miami-Dade.
Ramonita Toro said she fought hard to protect her children from the escapee with the help of her boyfriend and the same officers that arrested him prior to the home invasion, Thursday afternoon.
“As a mom, because you try so hard to protect them from things, inside out, outside in and when you feel that you can’t and now you got to go through this with them and mentally you can’t do nothing, it hurts,” Toro said.
She fought back tears while speaking to 7News just days after fighting off a would-be intruder.
“He’s crawling right here, I’m getting the kids in like this and by the time I get the last one in,” Toro said
Toro says she’s still shaken up, but she had no problem showing 7News how danger wound up on her doorstep after police say that the man in question, Jonathan Smith, escaped from the back of a squad car and wound up in Toro’s yard.
“You see a man with his shirt off, running, handcuffed, you don’t think nothing good, you don’t know what he did. My job as a mom is to protect the kids that live in this house, and I did it to the best of my ability,” Toro said.
Police said Smith was getting arrested after a traffic stop nearby, when things took a wild turn.
According to the arrest report, while Smith was sitting in the back of that cop car he “readjusted his handcuffs and placed them towards the front… opened the rear passenger/prisoner door and escaped,” leading officers on a chase to Toro’s house on Northwest 70th Street, trying to force his way inside.
“Half of his body right here gets in my door, and I’m pushing the door like, ‘Help! Help!’” Toro said.
With the help of her boyfriend, she was able to keep him from getting inside.
If you think it was hard for her, imagine what it was like for her five small children who were playing outside when it happened.
Seven-year-old Ericka explained what she saw.
“It was just us until we saw the cops come coming from this way, so we ran in the front yard.”
The kids were running, and of course, the officers were right behind Smith, so he was back in that squad car within minutes.
He’s facing a long list of charges, and it doesn’t look like he’s getting out anytime soon.
“It was kind of scary because he had blood all over him,” Erika said.
“He could have grabbed one of them, he could have did anything. That’s what I think about now,” Toro said.
Meanwhile, Toro said, now her number one priority is making her kids feel safe in their home again, which is no small feat.
“Because I go to work and I worry, every time someone knocks on that door are they going to run to the back?” she said.
Smith faces several charges for burglary, resisting an officer and driving without a license.
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