A Colorado couple had just welcomed the birth of their first child when their lives were turned upside down.
Joshua McCay and his wife Lindsay were getting settled into their new home in Windsor, when a case of mistaken identity almost ruined his life.
"It took us a long time so when we finally got pregnant for him we named him Theodore, which is Greek for God’s gift," said McCay.
McCay worked at a landscaping company which he says was pretty average, things were quiet. But what happened next is something he could’ve never imagined.
On August 31, Douglas County deputies were involved in a high speed chase where the car got away. According to CNN, the license plate number lead investigators to three people who admitted to being in the car, but said none of them were actually driving.
They told deputies a homeless man they met at King Soopers was the driver.
While the reporter for this story was conducting an interview with McCay, one of the people involved in the chase called. "Someone said oh since the cops don’t know who was driving let’s just come up with a fake name and we’ll tell them it was him and they’ll never be able to catch the guy because he isn’t real," said one of the parties involved.
Little did they know, the name they came up with was someone real.
"I was reading through it the statement the one guy said uh we think the drivers name is Josh or he might have been Erick and his last name is McCune or McCoy or McCay," said McCay.
Deputies discovered a Joshua McCay in Windsor when they put the name into the DMV database, along with a driver’s license photo. The three parties involved and a deputy agreed that was the driver of the car.
Shortly after, a felony warrant was issued for McCay’s arrest. The only reason he ended up finding out about the warrant was through the DMV, so he decided to turn himself in, according to CNN.
He spent the next 20 hours in jail. McCay had many ways to prove his alibi for that night, including his wife, GPS on his phone and truck, a Fitbit log showing his sleep patterns that night, but he was instead forced into a lengthy legal battle, according to CNN.
The day of the trial, it was all dismissed.
"I very truly regret lying and saying what I said. I didn’t know he was real and I didn’t know he would be affected so much by a stupid decision me and my friends made," said one of the parties involved.
McCay said hearing that has brought him some closure but doesn’t change the harm done to his family.
"We just want our life back financial we are in a mountain of debt over it.. but on top of that we want Douglas County Courts and Sheriffs to do better."
