Any fatal motor vehicle accident is upsetting, certainly, but not every fatal accident needs to end with criminal charges. There are some accidents that are nothing more than that, accidents, and Minneapolis-St. Paul drivers should not have to fear criminal punishment for being involved in them. Though the crash that took the life of a 20-year-old student at Augsburg College is tragic, it does not appear that the woman who is being charged in his death knew that she had hit anyone.
The 27-year-old woman had been driving in the Warehouse District at approximately 40 mph after leaving a friend’s birthday party when onlookers say she hit the 20-year-old man as he was crossing the street. The woman has told police, however, that she heard a crash and believed someone had thrown a rock at her window. Believing that someone would be violent enough to throw a rock at approximately 2:45 p.m., it is no wonder the woman did not stop. She even said that she was looking through her windshield after it shattered and did not see anyone or anything in the road.
While the woman’s license was revoked at the time of the accident, the only arrest on her criminal record was in 2006 for drunk driving. With no other citations on her account, it is unclear what the cause of the revoked license was. A sergeant with the Minneapolis Police Department also could not comment on why the 27 year old’s license was revoked.
The woman’s family has rallied around her as she sits in jail on $150,000 bail. Her aunt told police that there is no doubt that the woman would have stopped if she had known that she hit someone and her cousin told police that this was nothing more than an accident. Unfortunately for her, police don’t agree.
Source: Star Tribune, “Driver says she didn’t know she’d hit a person,” Paul Walsh and Nicole Norfleet, Oct. 30, 2012
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