SAN DIEGO COUNTY, Calif. — A grandmother on the hunt for a black Mercedes Benz that she said, knocked her grandson off his E-bike last month in Pacific Beach, believes she has found the car.
Pamela Taylor flagged down a San Diego Police motorcycle cop Thursday morning to report the Mercedes parked on Fanuel Street.
She pointed out damage on the passenger side of the vehicle, and said the owner matched the description of the driver involved in the incident with her grandson.
“The scrape runs from here all the way to here,” said Taylor, as she walked down the right side of the 2016 Mercedes S550.
It took Taylor two weeks and a lot of work to find the vehicle.
“I had to flag down a police officer this morning because I couldn't get through to any police officer. I flagged down this nice, young man on a motorcycle, who's been standing with me ever since,” she said.
Taylor believes it's the same car that hit her 22-year-old grandson off La Playa Ave. on Dec. 22, as he was riding home from work on his electric bicycle.
The grandson asked not to be identified in this report.
The gumshoe grandma did her own detective work to locate surveillance video from a liquor store showing a black Mercedes chasing after her grandson.
It all began as a road rage incident around 4:30 p.m., according to the grandma, when the driver of the Mercedes started yelling at her grandson for going too slow on Ingraham Street.
The grandson said the aggressive driver scared him, so he fled on the E-bike. The Mercedes chased the grandson into an alley where the driver ran into him, injuring him and destroying the E-bike, Taylor said.
CBS8 aired the surveillance video last week and two women contacted Taylor on Facebook, telling her they knew the location of the Mercedes.
“One of them contacted me about a week ago about the car, and I've been surveilling it ever since, trying to get the person that was driving it,” said Taylor.
The second tip came in Wednesday night, and the tipster claimed the owner matched the description of the driver: a man with black hair, full beard, and wearing a white lab coat.
“’Hallelujah, we have found him!’ I said, I wasn't going to quit until I found him and thank goodness for two women who have their eyes open,” said Taylor.
Detectives responded to the scene, in an urgent care parking lot, and discovered the vehicle had illegal license plates from a wrecked, 2015 Audi.
They took photos of the damage on the side of the vehicle and questioned the owner. Officers did not have enough evidence to arrest the owner at the scene, so CBS 8 is not identifying him.
Officers did tow away the Mercedes.
“Hopefully, the guy will be a man and own up. That's what I'm hoping for,” said the grandma.
The driver of the vehicle who hit Taylor’s grandson could face a felony assault with a deadly weapon charge, SDPD said last week.
“My message to this guy is, I told you not to mess with grandma. And you did, and we got you, hopefully we got you,” Taylor said.
Even if detectives can determine the Mercedes is the vehicle involved in the collision with the E-bike, they would still have to prove who was driving the car at the time of the incident.
A San Diego Police spokesperson emailed CBS 8 a statement stating, “The investigative team is not releasing any details at this time.”
WATCH RELATED: Grandma searches for Mercedes driver who hit her grandson in Pacific Beach (December 2021)