BOULDER, Colo. (KDVR) — A 28-year-old man has been arrested on a charge of aggravated motor vehicle theft for stealing a fire truck in Boulder, according to police.
According to an arrest affidavit obtained from the Boulder County Jail, 28-year-old Kirill Kiefel was arrested for the incident that took place on Sunday.
Boulder Police Officer Tyler Valdez responded to an emergency call at the intersection of 13th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue at around 1 a.m. Sunday. The Boulder intersection is in the University Hill neighborhood and is in front of the popular restaurant, The Sink.
According to Valdez, the emergency call was in response to someone stealing a Boulder Fire Department fire truck.
Valdez said that when he arrived on scene, he saw firefighters entering the truck and speaking with a man that was standing outside the driver’s seat of the truck. The man was identified as Kiefel and was the person who allegedly stole the fire truck, according to the affidavit.
After Valdez patted Kiefel down for weapons, he asked Kiefel what happened.
According to the affidavit, Kiefel told the officer that the firefighters had told him to move the truck. Valdez said this was not true.
Valdez spoke with the firefighters on scene who told him that they were assisting with a medical call when they saw their truck down at Pennsylvania Avenue and Broadway. A group of firefighters then ran towards the truck and jumped into it when it stopped moving, according to the affidavit.
The firefighters went on to tell Valdez that they were able to push the emergency brake inside the truck and pull Kiefel out of the driver’s seat. According to the firefighters, Kiefel managed to drive the truck from The Fox Theater on University Hill to the stoplights at Broadway Street and Pennsylvania Avenue. The distance is only about one-third of a mile.
“I know the firefighters were able to re-engage the parking brake. The truck never went into drive. It was always in neutral. So they re-engaged the parking brake to make sure everything was safe,” Boulder Fire Rescue Public Information Officer Marya Washburn said.
One of the firefighters said the fire truck had a value of around $750,000. The truck was returned back to the fire department undamaged and no injuries were reported.
Kiefel was arrested on charges of second-degree aggravated motor vehicle theft of more than $20,000 and a felony parole violation warrant.
Since his arrest, Valdez said that Kiefel’s behavior has “continued to escalate.”
“He has not been formally charged for every call we have received about him, but he has increasingly become a higher risk to public safety. Kirill also told me that he guaranteed he would be out of jail by tomorrow while I was transporting him,” said Valdez in the arrest affidavit.
Kiefel was transported to the Boulder County Jail and went before Judge David Archuleta in Boulder on Wednesday. Archuleta asked Kiefel if he had any questions.
“Yeah Mr. Honor I was just wondering, I took (inaudible) in Denver and I survived. I need somebody,“ Kiefel said on a video monitor. Keifel’s microphone was cut off, but it’s not clear by whom.
Kiefel’s public defender was sitting next to him as he was dressed in a red jail suit and wearing a mask. He appeared remotely on a video monitor from the Boulder County Jail.
Boulder police do not believe this incident is related to the other crimes that took place on University Hill Sunday.
