Woman Named in San Francisco Ambulance Theft, Crash

June 09--A suspect accused of stealing an ambulance in San Francisco and crashing it Tuesday morning on Yerba Buena Island was identified Wednesday as a 37-year-old woman with no local address, police said.

Veronica Barahona jumped into the San Francisco Fire Department's emergency rig around 8 a.m. at 55 Mason St. and hightailed it through city streets, said Officer Grace Gatpandan, a San Francisco police spokeswoman.

The ambulance had been left running while paramedics responded to a medical call at the Ambassador Hotel, and when they returned with the patient the rig was gone.

Police used a tracking system on the vehicle to pinpoint the driver as she careened through city streets and slammed into several vehicles. Barahona led police on a chase over the bottom deck of the Bay Bridge, police said, where she took a hard left turn on the Treasure Island Road off-ramp.

But a sharp curve in the road proved too challenging to negotiate, and the woman slammed into a concrete barrier, firefighters said.

The ambulance became stuck and burst into flames as Barahona got out and ran, police said.

She was quickly apprehended and booked into San Francisco County Jail on suspicion of felony vehicle theft, Gatpandan said.

Evan Sernoffsky is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: esernoffsky@sfchronicle.com Twitter: EvanSernoffsky

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