Richard Pratt has Stage 4 lung cancer. He knows he doesn’t have much time to live, he said. And he is prepared.

He was not, however, prepared to die Tuesday.

But he believed his chances of living another day were slim during a 22-minute chase that afternoon, with a man shoving a gun in his face telling him to drive faster and a string of squad cars, sirens screaming, trying to get him to stop.

And despite two painful cracked ribs suffered at the foot of an officer at the end of the chase, Pratt said he is prepared to let that go.

“I understand why he did it and I can forgive him for that,” Pratt said.

The ordeal started with terror for another victim about 1:20 p.m. Tuesday. A homeowner returned to his house on FM2164 north of Denton and noticed a blue Ford pickup in his yard. He asked the driver what he was doing there and was told the man was looking for his brother. Then the truck sped away.

The homeowner, Robert Denning, did not want to talk for this story. But according to the sheriff’s report, he then saw that his back door had been kicked in. He called 911, according to the sheriff’s report, and began backing his truck away from the house.

A wild-eyed man burst out of the house holding Denning’s AR-15 rifle, a second rifle, two shotguns and a handgun, and shouting “I’m going to kill you,” according to the report. The man came up to the homeowner’s truck with the handgun. Just as he began firing, the driver’s side mirror caught him and deflected the shot. One bullet smashed through the truck’s windshield and a second bullet struck the radiator. The man dropped the long guns and ran.

Pratt said he was driving home from visiting the oncologist about that time. He saw a man running down a driveway toward the highway.

He ran right up to Pratt’s SUV, waving his arms. Pratt had to stop because oncoming traffic blocked his way around the man. He rolled down his window a little bit, he said, and asked the man what was wrong.

“He said his father was injured and needed help. Then he pushed on the window and it automatically went down. He stuck his hand inside the car and opened the door. Then he jumped inside and shoved a gun practically in my mouth,” Pratt said. “Those windows are good for children but not so good for car jacking.”

The man was yelling, “Drive or I’ll kill you; don’t stop or I’ll kill you,” the victim said. And so began the struggle between the two men in the SUV as it wound up and down county roads, into Denton and back out again, and finally stopped in Woodhaven Mobile Home Community, formerly known as Silver Dome.

The man grabbed the steering wheel several times, causing the SUV to swerve around corners. He pushed on Pratt’s knee, trying to force the accelerator down harder. At first, only one squad car began following but more and more fell into line behind them with their lights flashing and their sirens blasting.

“I was hoping they would force us to stop, but they never were able to do that,” Pratt said.

Finally, they left Silver Dome Road and entered the mobile home community, still struggling over the accelerator and the steering wheel on the narrow, winding road. Officers familiar with the park knew there were only two entrances, and they spread out on the road leading out of the park.

The hijacker steered the car off the road and through backyards.

“We were running over cable boxes and people’s plants and gardens,” Pratt said. “An officer was standing there with his gun drawn. This idiot steered the car at the officer.”

The SUV finally became stuck on something it ran over in a yard. Officers, with guns drawn, immediately surrounded the vehicle, he said.

“They were yelling, ‘Get out! Get out!’” Pratt said. “In my mind, I’m a victim, but they didn’t know that, I guess. I’m still sitting in the car with my hands behind my head. Then the guy gets out of the car and shoves the gun down between my legs. He said, ‘Here, this is yours.’ I didn’t know what to do. I was scared I’d get shot if I tried to move the gun.”

Pratt said the officers continued to yell at him to get out of the SUV.

“I was yelling, ‘There’s a gun in my lap and it’s not mine!’”

But the suspect yelled to the officers that he was the victim and the driver had a gun.

An officer opened the door and Pratt was dragged out of the SUV. On the way down, he was kicked, cracking two of his ribs.

Pratt was handcuffed and placed in the back of a squad car. The suspect was placed inside another squad car while the officers sorted out who was a criminal and who might be a victim. Finally, Denton County sheriff’s Lt. David Scott told the other officers that he knew Pratt because they visited the same medical clinic. Scott knew Pratt was terminally ill and requested that an ambulance come for him. He was taken to an emergency room to be examined and was given pain patches for the ribs.

Wallace Eugene Judkins

Wallace Eugene Judkins, 38, was booked into county jail in lieu of $600,000 bail on charges that include attempted capital murder and aggravated kidnapping. He is being held without bail on a parole violation.

Pratt said the officer who kicked him apologized, and that he has no hard feelings.

An investigation is continuing into the series of events, including Pratt’s injuries.

“We’re still looking at that to see if too much force was used,” said Assistant Chief Deputy Steve Macsas on Thursday afternoon. “We do know what the factors are. We know that it came at the culmination of a 25-minute pursuit during which the car was steered at officers at least twice. We know there was a gun but we couldn’t see the gun. We did not know at that point whether he was a victim or a suspect.”

Macsas said the officer was using a technique to stun someone who might have been concealing a gun underneath his body as he fell to the ground.

“If we had known he was a victim and a cancer patient, this certainly would not have happened,” he said.

The sheriff’s office still is looking for the driver of the blue pickup truck who officials say most likely was an accomplice to the original burglary. Anyone wishing to give information can call the Crime Stoppers hotline at 1-800-388-TIPS (8477). Crime Stoppers offers a reward of up to $1,000 leading to an arrest in this or other crimes. Callers will remain anonymous.

DONNA FIELDER can be reached at 940-566-6885. Her e-mail address is dfielder@dentonrc.com .