A woman suffering an apparent mental health episode was arrested Thursday afternoon in North Carolina as bystanders laughed and encouraged police to use violence against her.
The woman, whose name was not released, started driving in circles in an intersection shortly before 4:30 p.m. in Gastonia, and several witnesses recorded video of the incident on their cell phones, reported the Gaston Gazette.
The videos show the woman, who is white, waving her arm out of the driver's side window as she drives repeatedly around the intersection of Ozark Avenue and North New Hope Road, striking at least one car that tried to drive past her.
The woman stopped when a Gastonia police officer arrived, and the officer said she told him her name was "Faith, hope and love."
The officer said he attempted to calm the woman, but instead she backed up and rammed into his patrol car.
The officer jumped out of the way to avoid being struck, and she slammed into the cruiser twice as she again started driving in circles.
She hit two other cars and a second police cruiser while driving in circles and then apparently lost control of her vehicle, knocking over a fire hydrant and driving over an embankment.
Her car overturned as it drove down a steep hill near a gas station, and police officers rushed to pull the woman from the upside-down vehicle.
Witnesses said the woman was singing, "Jesus loves the little children of the world," and shouting out pleas for bystanders to "look up" and "pray for me."
Police pulled her from the vehicle and appeared to wrestle with the woman, who continued shouting and singing as bystanders laughed.
"There you go, son -- manhandle that b*tch," one man says, drawing more laughs.
One bystander repeatedly encouraged police to "shoot her *ss."
Police said they used pepper spray to take the woman into custody, and she was then taken to a nearby hospital for a medical and psychological examination.
She will be charged with assault with a deadly weapon on an officer and careless and reckless driving, police said.
"We're not being bullied no more, we've had enough" the woman says, as she lay on the ground in handcuffed. "Nobody will bully us and tell us what to do."
She then began talking about God's law as an approaching ambulance siren drowned her out.
No one was injured in the incident.
Watch this video from the incident posted online by WCNC-TV:
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