Tonnetta Evans was arrested and faces more than a dozen charges after Hillsborough County deputies say she drove off during a traffic stop with a deputy partly inside her Kia, then hit a school bus carrying 41 students on Sept. 23. No students were hurt.
Deputies stopped the silver Kia Forte around 4:36 p.m. on West Hillsborough Avenue after saying both brake lights were out. The bus sustained minor damage, and the 41 Pierce Middle School students were transferred to another bus and taken home.
HCSO said a search recovered an object it described as a pipe bomb or explosive device, weapons and ammunition, other people’s IDs and cards, $1,100 in counterfeit $100 bills, coins, methamphetamine, marijuana and prescription pills. The office said the Kia had been reported stolen in Kentucky in 2022. HCSO listed charges including aggravated battery of an officer with a deadly weapon, armed methamphetamine possession and aggravated fleeing to elude. The agency also said Evans was arrested on a Kentucky failure-to-appear warrant for meth possession and identity theft, and had nine felony convictions in Indiana and two in Kentucky.
