QUEENS — A career criminal from Florida who had been on the run for more than a month after allegedly striking a police officer with a stolen truck in August was nabbed by cops in Queens on Monday, cops said.
Gary Sarback, 61, of Lake Worth, Fla. was arrested Monday around 5:30 p.m. in the 109th Precinct, which covers Flushing, and is being charged with attempted murder of a police officer, assault, unauthorized use of a vehicle and criminal possession of stolen property, an NYPD spokesman said.
The details of the arrest were not immediately available, the spokesman said.
Police had been hunting for Sarback since Aug. 22 after he allegedly snatched a purse from a woman in East Elmhurst, then took off in a black Ford pickup. The vehicle had been reported stolen two days earlier in Florida with .38 caliber gun inside, the NYPD said.
Later that day, two officers in Astoria spotted the stolen car near Crescent Street and Broadway, in Astoria. They attempted to pull Sarback over when he allegedly hit one of the officers with the truck, cops said.
Officers fired at the car as it fled the scene, and police briefly shut down the Queensboro Bridge while cops searched the area for Sarback, according to published reports.
The two officers were taken to New York Hospital with non-life threatening injuries, where they were treated and released, cops said. Police said Sarback later abandoned the truck at 37th Street and 24th Avenue and fled on foot.
Sarback was later spotted in the Rego Park area and was believed to be the suspect a purse-snatching there as well as several other purse snatchings in Queens, sources said earlier this month.
According to sources and court records, Sarback has more than three dozen arrests dating back to 1969, including for burglary and robbery.
