Matthew Reisen
Albuquerque Journal, N.M.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A patient left the University of New Mexico Hospital Friday afternoon by stealing an ambulance only to be readmitted soon after with back pain once she crashed into a light pole and embankment, according campus police.
Ashley Ulibarri, 25, faces a charge of unlawful taking of the motor vehicle, and was booked into the Metropolitan Detention Center later the same day.
According to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court, Ulibarri was discharged from the hospital around 4 p.m. and began to walk toward the open doors of an ambulance parked outside. She tried to get into one ambulance but was chased off by security.
UNMPD said she then “circled around” and got into another ambulance, backing out of the parking lot. Ulibarri drove westbound on Lomas NE and hit a light pole, then another vehicle, before getting stuck on the embankment beside Interstate 25.
According to the court document, when officers arrived Ulibarri had jumped into a gurney in back of the ambulance and was pretending to be a patient. Police say she was “shaken up and didn’t talk very much.”
Ulibarri later told police she had just been kicked out of UNMH when she saw the ambulance, which was “running, unlocked and nobody was around it.”
“She wanted to get heroin so she took the ambulance to find some,” an officer wrote.
Ulibarri then told police she hurt her back in the crash and was taken back to the hospital.
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©2019 the Albuquerque Journal (Albuquerque, N.M.)