Scottsdale Cyclist dies after hit-and-run crash

Below is chronological history of hit-and-run fatality w/DUI, incident occurred 1/13/2012 through sentencing.

The sentence is, apparently, from what we now know, typical. Despite what appear to be harsh penalties for any hit-and-run, the justice system (courts and prosecutors) ignore what appear to be minimum sentences; for example the felony 3 the driver plead guilty to carries a presumptive minimum of 3.5 years in prison, and a mandatory suspension of driver’s license from 5 to 10 years; and these penalties are to run  in addition to any other penalties (in this case, the extreme DUI). In short, it appears nobody goes to prison for hit-and-run; the statutory penalties are a paper tiger.

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Suspected alcohol involved and hit-and-run driver who seriously injured bicyclist Steven Douglas Langager on January 13, 2012. Langager subsequent died from injuries sustained.
The driver’s name was never released in the media; Scottsdale PD PIO said the suspect in the “Jan collision included Roger Stevensen, 60 yrs old” (probably ROGER ALLAN STEVENSON, 05/1951).
He was subsequently indicted in September on charges of extreme DUI and felony H&R; the case is docketed as S-0700-CR-2012008319 Continue reading “Scottsdale Cyclist dies after hit-and-run crash”

Bicycling Prohibitions on Highways/Freeways

From time to time, the question about bicycling on freeways (a.k.a. highways, or more officially “controlled access highways”) comes up. Just what are the rules? This ADOT page has a good summary:

…Of course, not all roads are open to pedestrians and bicyclists – pedestrians are prohibited from walking along all controlled-access highways. Bicyclists are permitted by ADOT policy to ride on the shoulders of controlled-access highways, except where prohibited…

Let’s dig a little deeper… By statute, the state (ADOT) or local authorities may prohibit bicyclists’ use of any part of a controlled-access highway: Continue reading “Bicycling Prohibitions on Highways/Freeways”

Pedestrian struck by vehicle on sidewalk dies

Another, seriously how often does this happen?

Woman killed by truck identified

A pickup truck full of teenagers struck and killed a 23-year-old woman named Jackie Ruiz Saturday (2/2/2013) afternoon as she was walking on the sidewalk near 19th Ave and Thunderbird Road. Police say the 1997 Dodge 2500 pickup up truck was swerving before it left the roadway and went up on the sidewalk hitting Ruiz and then barreled into an apartment patio wall…The driver was identified as an 18 year old male. He had three other teens with him, said Phoenix Police Sgt. Steve Martos…

Think you’re safe in your car?

Man arrested in I-17 fatal crash in north Phoenix

Police have arrested a man suspected of killing a 61-year-old man in a high-speed collision on Interstate 17 in north Phoenix on Monday night (6/17/2013), a Department of Public Safety official said Tuesday…. Police say the white sedan was driven by Vick A. House (the victim)… Police are not releasing the name of the suspect yet.

…

More Sprawl Costs

Az Republic story Liability for government-issued vehicles on the rise Stated some of the obvious; bigger, sprawly cities tend to have more driving by public-sector workers, invariably leading to more liability costs to cities/taxpayers. Just another socialized cost of sprawl and automobility.

The sidebar has some interesting dollar figures for a number of Phoenix-metro area cities (and Maricopa county), all were costs paid out by the municipality over the period from ~ 2008 through 20012. A small, compact city like Tempe clocks in at $806K, Scottsdale is up at $2M. Scottsdale at a population of ~ 221K people is somewhat larger than Tempe’s 164K; but certainly not nearly triple! But Scottsdale’s land area at 186 sq.mi. is way larger than landlocked, mostly built-out Tempe’s 40 sq.miles.

Phoenix is of course the 500 pound gorilla: $23M paid out, with 1.5M people, and a whopping 517 sq. miles of land area.

Statistically speaking, Chandler seems to have a quite-low payout ratio; $203K, 240K population and 58 sq.miles — so maybe Scottsdale is just an outlier 🙂

Car plows into bus stop killing 1; DUI likely, police say

Really? Oh yeah, and of course it was hit-and-run. Oh, yeah, witnesses say the driver ran a red light. incident occurred 5/13/2013 around 0400.

http://www.azfamily.com/news/Car-plows-into-bus-stop-1-dead-2-suspects-on-the-loose-207185831.html

Dead ped at a bus stop? Seriously, how often do thinkgs like this happen? Pretty often apparently. And, oh yeah, in March a suspected dui driver slammed into a Phoenix bus stop and killed 2 people — at least that guy didn’t (or couldn’t) hit-and-run.

Oh well back to the present case, excerpts:

One person is dead, a second is injured and a third is in police custody after a car plowed into a Phoenix bus stop before sunrise Monday. Police believe the driver, a 22-year-old Hispanic woman, was impaired at the time of the wreck…. According to police, a black sedan was heading north on 27th Avenue when the driver ran a red light. She swerved to avoid two cars, veered off the road and slammed into the bus stop by the 7-Eleven at Indian School Road… Harry Cleveland, 50, was sitting on the bus bench when the car hit it. He took the brunt of the impact and died about an hour later at a local hospital. A 20-year-old man who had been sitting on another bench, was taken to a local hospital, as well. His condition was not immediately available. A 19-year-old woman who also was waiting at the bus stop managed to dodge the out-of-control car and avoid injury…. Witnesses told investigators that the driver, now identified as Elsa Olivares, and the passenger ran away from the scene. Police checked the vehicle’s registration and went to the address listed. While en route to that apartment, police received a call from Olivares. After telling them she was involved in the crash, she turned herself in.

Update

Late May, the suspect entered not-guilty pleas to all charges, the usual litany: 2nd Degree Murder, agg assault, endangerment, leaving the scene of a fatal. You can read all about it case lookup (or here at Maricopa County Superior Court directly) St of AZ Vs. Elsa Priscila Olivares CR-2013421459; case minutes.  State’s Attorney is Rebecca Kennelly. Defendant’s Attorney is presently Jesus Acosta (i believe appointed?). This is a “complex case”. Trial is currently set for mid-January 2014.

Formal list of charges:

13-1103 (F2) MANSLAUGHTER 5/13/2013
13-1204 (F3) AGGRAVATED ASSAULT 5/13/2013
13-1201 (F6) ENDANGERMENT 5/13/2013
28-661 (F2) HIT AND RUN W/DEATH/INJURY

Arrest made in boy’s hit-and-run parking lot death

[Update:  Driver Mabior Ding,  was sentenced  to 10 years in prison and five years supervised probation, as part of a plea deal; charges of manslaughter and leaving the scene of a fatal collision kpho.com. There is/was some suggestion or confusion that leaving the scene cannot apply to private property??  Also notable, this incident does NOT appear in official traffic records; perhaps because it was private property(?)]

Phew, the horrendous news just keeps on coming
An 11-year old boy was killed May 25(?), 2013. The driver initially tried to help the victim, but then fled the scene. The boy was walking with his mother in the an apartment complex parking lot when he became pinned to a cinder block wall by a driver backing up. Killed while walking in a parking lot? Seriously, how often does stuff like this happen? Continue reading “Arrest made in boy’s hit-and-run parking lot death”

Data Collection of Bicyclist Helmet Use in Crashes

I have some questions/concerns/misgivings about helmet usage as it relates to bicyclist safety and crash reports. It seems to me that it is not well-reported… (update; sometime in the late 2010s this was updated; skip below to the 11th edition…

Arizona Crash Report (10th Edition)

Curiously, given the hoopla intense interest surrounding bicyclist helmet usage, there is NO place on the ACR to report whether or not a bicyclist was using a helmet. There is a block for each traffic unit(4dd) and passenger(5c), SafetyDevice  lists things like helmet/airbag/seatbelt and so forth. However, this block is always supposed to be coded 0/Not Applicable, and is explicitly never to be 1/None Used, or 5/Helmet Used for pedalcyclists. See p.23, 26 of 2010 Arizona’s Crash Report Forms Instruction Manual. (this was block 4ff)

Clearly this is often coded not according to the manual, see below for some live data e.g. from 2010. We might guess that the 10% or so that say Helmet Used probably does mean those bicyclists had helmets, and likewise probably the 35% that said None Used probably means not helmet. But the other 55% is (from the data) anybody’s’ guess.

There is likewise no place on the ACR to code for nighttime crashes whether or not a bicyclist was using required lighting equipment (a front headlight or a rear taillight/reflector).

Arizona Crash Report (11th, 12th & 13th Edition)

the helmet business was changed and made explicit. Some of these changes were in the 11th edition (I have only a draft), below is what is in the 13th Edition, Revised August 2023: here are the salient bits, with my emphasis added:

5ff ‐ Safety Devices - The restraint equipment in use by the occupant, or the helmet use by a motorcyclist, at the time of the crash.
0. Not Applicable - Use for driverless/parked vehicles or pedestrians. Do not use this code for motorcycle operators or pedalcyclists.
1. None Used - Any occupant of the motor vehicle (driver, passenger) did not use a device or in the case of a motorcycle or pedalcyclist, did not use a helmet.
5. Helmet Used - This attribute applies to helmets used by drivers and passengers of all motorized cycles (motorcycles, mopeds, minibikes, motor scooters, and all-terrain vehicles) This should also be used for non-motorists such as pedalcyclists or a pedestrian on a skateboard

 

So that’s that. This field shows up in the database in the person table as SafetyDevice. Although there are still hundreds of “NOT APPLICABLE” for pedalcyclists despite being explicitly wrong, per the manual. At a few hundred, there are also more UNKNOWNS thank I would like to see. There are also a couple dozen apparent oddballs like seat belts, even one airbag(!). See comment below for sample data dump from 2010 and 2024.

SELECT SafetyDevice, eSafetyDevice, count(*) FROM 2021_person
WHERE ePersonType LIKE 'PEDAL%' GROUP BY 1, 2 ORDER BY SafetyDevice;

I didn’t check into the other issue regarding lighting, there’s some other fields, but only in the fatal suppleement regarding non-occupant safety devices: things like reflective clothing, lights; in any event that doesn’t get captured into the (state) database, though it presumably gets passed along into FARS.

FARS

For 1994 through 2009; all persons including bicyclists and other pedalcyclists used the P10 Restraint/Helmet Use field. The column was called REST_USE in the person table.

From 2010 and later, this info was moved to a whole new dataset, the SafetyEq table. the column name is MSAFEQMT; and it’s slightly annoying because it’s indexed by ST_CASE (i.e. the case number), and person number. There can be any number of records for any given person.

The field is called NM13 Non-Motorist Safety Equipment “This element indicates the safety equipment that was used by the non-motorist
involved in the crash”, in the FAR Manual. In the FAR Validation Manual, there’s an elaborate confusing explanation of differentiating between Not Reported and Unknown. Allowable values are:

  1. None
  2. Helmet
  3. Reflective Clothing (jacket, backpack, etc.)
  4. Protective Pads Used (elbows, knees, shins, etc.)
  5. Lighting
  6. (not used)
  7. Other Safety Equipment
  8. Not Reported
  9. Unknown if Used

 

For reference, you can see mmucc.us‘s field P23 Non-Motorist Safety Equipment from (MMUCC is a nhtsa-funded group that sets standards for data collection on traffic crash reports). This is consistent with FARS definition; except that mmucc says only two may be selected for any person, and FARS allows any number to be selected (theoretically, the vast majority have either one or two selected).

 

Rate of bicycle-related fatalities significantly lower in states with helmet laws?

Annoyingly I cannot find the actual article by searching The Journal of Pediatrics website jpeds.com/search/quick so we may never know… Apparently they’ve taken the tactic of flooding the internet with press releases that don’t even mention the name of the article.

In any event I am having a hard time seeing that helmet use data is well-reported, please see data-collection-of-bicyclist-helmet-use-in-crashes; if the data is not accurately collected and reported, studies such as these that simply mine FARS data seem really suspect.

From a press release (my emphasis): “Existing research shows that bicyclists who wear helmets have an 88 percent lower risk of brain injury, but researchers at Boston Children’s Hospital found that simply having bicycle helmet laws in place showed a 20 percent decrease in deaths and injuries for children younger than 16 who were in bicycle-motor vehicle collisions”

I think helmets are great; but it seems to me they are being over-sold. Here there is a general claim of an enormous reduction in TBI, and then further that there is a modest safety bump in JUST HAVING A LAW. hmmm. so many questions.

  1. what does rate mean? my guess is it’s population based; it would be far better if it were exposure based. I wouldn’t be surprised to see pediatric exposure has been declining. The study I noted at effects-of-bicycle-helmet-laws-on-childrens-injuries from National Bureau of Economic Research made more sense to me: helmet laws = less cycling = lower “rates” of death/injury mostly because most people figure rates based on population and not exposure
  2. obviously, what’s really more interesting is compliance rate, and not just whether or not a state has a law. plus how do they handle local laws(e.g. tucson and a few other Arizona cities have a minor helmet law, though there is no state law).
  3. helmet data in FARS; the last time i remember checking , there were a *lot* of “unknowns” in the helmet yes/no box. This should be pretty easy to check, at least for 2010 and 11 now that I have my own FARS database up and running.
  4. Another study out of Canada and published in BMJ found helmet laws had little to no effect; what they describe as an underlying baseline effect. “…  the incremental contribution of provincial helmet legislation to reduce hospital admissions for head injuries seems to have been minimal.“

In case you were wondering here is the list of Arizona cities/jurisdictions that have MHLs: mandatory-bicycle-helmet-laws-in-arizona

Bicyclist killed in Tucson hit-and-run was SunTran driver

05/23/2013 Bicyclist John Akers was struck and killed at the intersection of Mission and Irvington Road; this is near but outside of Tucson, and so Pima County Sheriff’s Office handled the investigation. The driver fled the scene. Akers was on his way to work around 3:30a as a SunTran driver. Deputies located a suspect vehicle and a suspect was arrested a few hours later. The bicyclist was northbound, and the motorist was eastbound — this is a signalized intersection.  Bicyclist killed in Tucson hit-and-run was SunTran driver

tucsonvelo.com has reported that “Pima County Sheriff’s Deputy and BAC liaison Ryan Roher said via email that alcohol was involved. He said the suspect left the scene, but was later apprehended by Pima County deputies. According to Roher the cyclist was wearing a helmet and witnesses indicate the cyclist was riding  ‘within the law.’ ”

The Criminal Case

Pima County Superior Court case CR20132547

UPDATED Jan 2014 tucsonvelo.com: “The driver who hit and killed John Akers, a SunTran driver who was cycling to work, has been sentenced to 15 years in jail, the Arizona Daily Star is reporting … Enrique F. Hernandez plead guilty to a reduced charge of manslaughter, leaving the scene of a crash that caused a death as well as driving under the influence”…”Hernandez, 25, ran a stop light at Mission and Irvington roads where he plowed into John Akers, who was riding his bike to work. Hernandez then fled the scene”

If this bit from the azstar is correct: “Hernandez was sentenced to 10 years in prison for the manslaughter charge and five years for leaving the scene of a deadly accident. Those prison terms will be served consecutively.” It is the ONLY sentence I’ve EVER seen where prison time will actually be served for hit-and-run.

Phoenix police officer dies in fatal hit-and-run

vehicleRaetzHitAndRunFatality[Update: driver sentenced, see below] Although it seems obvious that police work is dangerous because there are bad guys with guns trying to kill them; roughly the same number of  policeman killed in the line of duty die as the result of a traffic collision than by being shot (or stabbed)….

May 19, 2013 ~ 3:30a, Phoenix police officer Daryl Raetz was killed while “processing a DUI suspect near 51st and Cambridge avenues when he was struck by a green Ford Expedition, which then fled the scene”. azcentral.com. The story doesn’t give much detail, I would assume from what was presented he was a pedestrian, which is consistent with the picture of the SUV that struck Raetz, which police released later. Continue reading “Phoenix police officer dies in fatal hit-and-run”

Phx PD Officer’s SUV hit by red-light runner

A Phoenix police officer was injured in a collision with red-light-runner at Sweetwater and 43rd Ave. The red-light-runner was described only as “elderly”. As a result of the collision, both vehicles careened out of control up and over the sidewalks, one striking a tree and another a wall. Although there were three fairly minor injuries, it appears serious injury (or fatality) was only avoided by a stroke of luck that no one was walking there. How often do cars drive up over the sidewalk?

 azcentral.com news report:
A car reportedly ran a red light and slammed into a Phoenix police SUV, leaving the officer and two others injured Thursday morning, according to authorities. The police SUV was heading east on Sweetwater Avenue about 9:30 a.m., said Lt. Ben Leuschner of the Phoenix Police Department. The car, with an elderly couple inside, was going south on 43rd Avenue. The car ran a red light and slammed into the police SUV, according to police. The car ended up hitting a wall and the police SUV was pushed off the side of the road. All three people had to be extricated from their vehicles. The officer’s injuries weren’t considered serious. The conditions of the people in the car weren’t immediately available.

I don’t know anything about that area of town, however, I will comment that Sweetwater looks like a nice calm road, whereas 43rd Ave is a standard city of Phoenix car-sewer.

Tragedies just keep on coming

… A few days later on May 19th, Phoenix police officer Daryl Raetz was killed while “processing a DUI suspect near 51st and Cambridge avenues when he was struck by a green Ford Expedition, which then fled the scene”. azcentral.com. The story doesn’t give much detail, i would assume from what was presented he was a pedestrian.

Continue reading “Phx PD Officer’s SUV hit by red-light runner”

Casa Grande PD nabs hit and run suspect

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[ 11/28/2016 complaint: EXCEED SPEED LIMIT BY 20/45 MPH, plead guilty. see below. Was Wuertz speeding when he hit and nearly killed Brennan and then fled the scene in 2013? Is he still on probation?   ]

[Mar 2014 — plea / plea agreement dated 2/24/2014  The plea stipulates no jail; Wuertz pleas guilty to endangerment, a very low level felony (it even automatically conditionally converts to a misdemeanor). More importantly there is no hit-and-run conviction. That charge, besides being a serious felony, would have resulted in a 5 to 10 year driver license revocation — though the deal does state that “pursuant to 28-3304 the defendant’s license shall be revoked”. Though I’m not sure for how long. Section (A)3 states license must be revoked for commission of any felony w/motor vehicle. I’m not sure when sentencing is but it’s pretty much a done deal] Continue reading “Casa Grande PD nabs hit and run suspect”

DUI suspected in Phoenix crash that injured 5

Yikes — head on collision with multiple life-threatening injuries to the children, whom police said were all properly restrained.

It was a glorious late-April morning in Phoenix, the sun had been up for just an hour, the kids were all buckled in…  seriously, how often does stuff like this happen happen? By the way, neither of the vehicles involved were remarkable, the victim was driving a Pontiac G6 and the suspect was driving a Mitsubishi Galant; both mid-sized sedans in the 3,000 pound weight range.
The collision occurred on Southern Avenue near 38th St, Southern Avenue is typical of the Phoenix Metro area’s many, fine, wide, straight, multi-laned, high-speed arterial streets (appears to be posted 45mph); they work really well except when drivers bump into one another, or a ped, or a a cyclist; and then people get seriously injured or die. Continue reading “DUI suspected in Phoenix crash that injured 5”

Driver sentenced in Tucson dui / hitandrun / switcheroo fatality

I’m collecting this here mostly for completeness; this is the case involving the death of motorized bicyclist, Craig Lewis, 47.  The perp is Samantha Baldwin, 23. Lewis was struck from behind while riding on the shoulder along W. Ajo Highway near Soledad Ave around 1 a.m. on May 19, 2012. Thanks to tucsonvelo.com for their coverage Continue reading “Driver sentenced in Tucson dui / hitandrun / switcheroo fatality”