Maryland Car Accident Attorney Blog
Automobile injury accidents can be severe and cause tens of thousands of dollars in medical and related costs. It’s bad enough to be saddled with these costs without having them be caused by another driver’s negligence. As Maryland auto injury attorneys, my firm helps people who have suffered injuries from cuts and bruises to closed head injuries and spinal damage.
A recent news story showed what can happen when someone fails to consider the safety and wellbeing of others as a result of their own mistake. According to reports, six people were sent to the hospital following a car crash with a man running from the police in the early morning hours of July 4th. The chase began when a Maryland State Police trooper, already at the scene of a previous accident on Route 33, observed an oncoming being driven erratically.
The officer was sitting in his vehicle when he noticed the approaching vehicle obviously weaving and crossing the roadway centerline. Pulling away from the scene of the first collision, the trooper followed and then pulled over a Ford Explorer. While interviewing the SUV’s driver, the patrolman recognized the smell of alcohol on the driver’s breath. When the officer requested the man to exit his vehicle, the driver instead drove quickly away, nearly hitting the policeman in the process.
The 19-year-old driver, later identified as Armand J. Cornish, led the patrolman on a chase from Route 33 onto the Easton bypass and then onto Route 50 eastbound. Additional traffic enforcement patrols from the Easton Police Department and Talbot County Sheriff’s Office were called to assist in the pursuit.
News accounts indicate that the chase continued along Route 50 at speeds exceeding 100 mph, during which police reportedly saw beer cans being thrown from the fleeing vehicle. Officers attempted to stop the suspect using stop sticks on the eastern side of the bridge in Cambridge. The man’s Explorer rolled over the stop sticks and seconds later hit the back end of an eastbound Mustang. Cornish then apparently lost control of his sport utility vehicle, which traveled across the median and then across the westbound lanes of Route 50. It came to rest on an adjacent pedestrian sidewalk.
In the process, the driver of the Mustang was trapped inside his vehicle and had to be extricated by crews from the Cambridge Fire Department. That person reportedly sustained critical injuries during the crash.
Six people in all were injured during the incident; three in the Mustang and three in the Explorer. All six were taken to Eastern Shore hospitals, including Cornish, who was later transferred to the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore prior to being released to the authorities.
Police charged Cornish with multiple offenses including attempting to elude police by fleeing on foot, attempting to elude police by failing to stop, failure to remain at scene of accident involving bodily injury, driving a motor vehicle on a suspended license. Other charges were pending at the time of the news report.
Pursued by Police, Suspect Driver Sends 6 to Hospitals, WJLA.com, July 4, 2010