Just 10 minutes after officers in a Belleville Police patrol vehicle had pulled out of a favorite spot where it runs radar checks on vehicles coming over the Belleville Bridge, a car sped into that parking lot, smashed into a building, and ended on its side on the lakeside deck.
Belleville Police Chief Hal Berriman said the incident happened at about 2:32 a.m. Saturday, June 11, at Hayward’s party store.
Chief Berriman said the car came over the bridge into the city and didn’t make the curve. After hitting the corner of the party store it went through the fence, and dropped onto the deck on its side.
He said a female that had been in the car fled the scene and the man who remained told police the woman was the driver.
The woman had left her purse in the car and when she came to J&T Crova towing yard to retrieve her purse, she was arrested.
Chief Berriman said the woman was wanted on a felony warrant in Texas and that department said it will extradite her.
The man in the car was taken to the hospital to be examined even though he said he wasn’t injured. Chief Berriman said the drop from the parking lot to the deck was a substantial distance and the impact was severe.
He said police were investigating further since it was unsure who was driving.
In an interesting side story, Chief Berriman said while Officer Matthew Vandeweghe was handling things at the scene of the accident, Officer Kendra Rose gave a fire fighter a lift back to the fire hall to pick up something.
That’s when a tow truck driver alerted her there was a car parked in the middle of the street in front of the police department with the driver asleep at the wheel.
She found the driver asleep with a marijuana cigarette in his hand and 26 grams of marijuana in a bag in his car. He was cited for driving under the influence.
Maybe of we were harder on people like the guy smoking weed and falling asleep behind the wheel, we may have less cases like the girl running into party stores and falling onto the deck. I’m not saying that there is any relation between the 2 incidents and we probably won’t know if the girl was on anything or drunk since they didn’t catch her until the effects could have worn off. But this guy is smoking weed while driving, has more weed in his car ready to be smoked, falls asleep behind the wheel, and just gets a citation? I’m all for legalizing marijuana, but they need to also get harder on the ones misusing it. These are the people that will get the rights taken away for all.