Fatal leap preceded by chase, icy plunge
Posted: Thu Dec 08, 2005 2:05 am
i don't mean to be morbid, but this is what i dealt with Monday night/ Tuesday morning. happened on property.
By TOM ALEX
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
December 7, 2005
An Osceola man who leaped to his death from a downtown Des Moines parking ramp Tuesday was going through marital problems and had earlier jumped into an icy lake in an apparent suicide attempt, police and relatives said.
Police chased Roger Hockel, 39, in his car from Norwalk to Des Moines after relatives called about 1 a.m. and described him as intoxicated and suicidal.
Officers found footprints in the snow at Lake Colchester in Norwalk. They also found a whiskey bottle, a hole in the ice, and more prints that led toward the shore.
Police said Hockel was wet when he returned to a relative's home in Norwalk, where he climbed into a car and drove away.
"He had threatened suicide in the past," Norwalk Police Chief Ed Kuhl said. "There was a pending divorce."
Hockel was spotted by officers headed north on Iowa Highway 28. Norwalk police followed in what Kuhl described as "a slow-speed pursuit" that never topped 45 mph. Windsor Heights police laid down a tire-flattening device to stop the vehicle, but Hockel drove on with severely damaged tires, the exposed rims spewing sparks into downtown Des Moines.
The radio in Hockel's car was booming as he reached the top of a parking ramp in the 900 block of High Street, police said. He got out, left the door open and the engine running, then hurried to the west side of the ramp and without hesitation rolled over the side and fell to his death, Des Moines police Sgt. Todd Dykstra said.
He said Hockel didn't give officers a chance to speak to him.
Hockel is the second suicidal man in 10 weeks to jump from a downtown parking ramp.
Police were able to talk with William Lewis, 25, before he jumped on Sept. 27 and landed near the corner of Seventh Street and Grand Avenue. Lewis survived with at least a dozen broken bones.
By TOM ALEX
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
December 7, 2005
An Osceola man who leaped to his death from a downtown Des Moines parking ramp Tuesday was going through marital problems and had earlier jumped into an icy lake in an apparent suicide attempt, police and relatives said.
Police chased Roger Hockel, 39, in his car from Norwalk to Des Moines after relatives called about 1 a.m. and described him as intoxicated and suicidal.
Officers found footprints in the snow at Lake Colchester in Norwalk. They also found a whiskey bottle, a hole in the ice, and more prints that led toward the shore.
Police said Hockel was wet when he returned to a relative's home in Norwalk, where he climbed into a car and drove away.
"He had threatened suicide in the past," Norwalk Police Chief Ed Kuhl said. "There was a pending divorce."
Hockel was spotted by officers headed north on Iowa Highway 28. Norwalk police followed in what Kuhl described as "a slow-speed pursuit" that never topped 45 mph. Windsor Heights police laid down a tire-flattening device to stop the vehicle, but Hockel drove on with severely damaged tires, the exposed rims spewing sparks into downtown Des Moines.
The radio in Hockel's car was booming as he reached the top of a parking ramp in the 900 block of High Street, police said. He got out, left the door open and the engine running, then hurried to the west side of the ramp and without hesitation rolled over the side and fell to his death, Des Moines police Sgt. Todd Dykstra said.
He said Hockel didn't give officers a chance to speak to him.
Hockel is the second suicidal man in 10 weeks to jump from a downtown parking ramp.
Police were able to talk with William Lewis, 25, before he jumped on Sept. 27 and landed near the corner of Seventh Street and Grand Avenue. Lewis survived with at least a dozen broken bones.