Driver cited after crash debris hits bus passenger

By Mary Manning, Torey Van Oot

Published Thursday, June 4, 2009 | 11:52 a.m.

Updated Thursday, June 4, 2009 | 3:17 p.m.

Metro Police say the 19-year-old man who lost control of a car that crashed into a Citizens Area Transit bus on Boulder Highway and Lamb Boulevard today, injuring a departing passenger, will be charged.

Drugs or alcohol are likely a factor in the Thursday morning crash in which a man who didn't have a driver's license lost control of his car, crashed into a light pole and struck the CAT bus as a 45-year-old woman got off the bus from a rear exit, Officer Bill Cassell said.

Both the driver and the bus passenger were taken to a hospital with non life-threatening injuries, Cassell said.

When the driver is released from the hospital he will be taken to the Clark County Detention Center and charged with driving under the influence, Cassell said.

The late-model silver Chevy Impala was traveling southbound on Lamb, approaching Boulder Highway, about 11:16 a.m., when the left wheel of the vehicle struck the center median, collapsing the tire and causing the vehicle to lose control, police said.

The car jumped over the median and struck the bus shelter. It then bounced off the bench and hit a pole, becoming wedged between the bus bench and a bus that had pulled up and stopped.

A passenger leaving the CAT bus was struck by debris, believed to be the car's bumper, which broke off during the crash and hit the woman exiting at the back of the bus.

"In all probability we are looking at an arrest for a drug- or alcohol-, or both, related DUI, but at this point the investigation is ongoing," Cassell said.

Jeffrey Martin, 31, said he was the owner of the car and a passenger at the time of the crash. He said he and the driver, who he identified as his friend, Jeff, had left the Boulder Station Casino to use an ATM at the Sinclair gas station on the corner of Lamb and Boulder Highway and were on their way home when the driver lost control of the car.

Martin said they had taken a right turn, traveling northbound on Lamb, after being unable to turn left out of the gas station. They turned around in the Boulder Station entrance, making a right turn to continue southbound on Lamb.

"The next thing I know we were losing control and we crossed this median ... And into the bus stop," Martin said.

Martin said alcohol and drugs were "not at all" a factor and that, as far as he knew, his friend had a license. Police did cite Martin for allowing a person without a license to drive his car. "I didn't know he didn't have a license," Martin said.

There have been at least five deadly collisions at Las Vegas bus stops in recent years.

Steven N. Murray, 44, was sentenced to 18 years to life on May 21 after he swerved his pickup truck at Flamingo Road and Boulder Highway, where it jumped a curb and hit two people on July 7, 2008. Patricia Ann Hoff, 51, died from her injuries. Porshe Hughes, 26, was critically injured, losing both legs in the crash. Murray was arrested for driving under the influence because he had taken two prescription drugs.

In March 2005, Veronica Schmidt plowed her Ford Explorer SUV into a bus stop at Smoke Ranch and Rock Springs roads, killing Raquel and Angelica Jimenez, 16 and 14, along with Samantha Allen, 36, and Reginald Williams, 16. Schmidt was placed under eight months' house arrest, but was sentenced to 180 days in jail in December 2007 because she failed to complete 60 hours of community service and pay $5,000 in court fees and fines.

In May 2004, Nicholas Serrano-Villagrana killed 4-year-old Eulogia Avendano and injured two others when he hit them at a bus shelter at Eastern Avenue and U.S. 95. He was sentenced to 12 to 40 years in prison after convictions on three counts of felony driving under the influence causing substantial bodily harm.

On Christmas Day 2003, Bruce L. Kirton, 49, died after a vehicle ran a red light, struck a car and hit Kirton at a bus stop.

In October 2002, John Wan, 50, died standing at a bus stop near Charleston Boulevard and Fremont Street when a drunk driver hit him in a pickup truck.

Officer Cassell, when asked about the latest collision involving a bus and bus shelter, said, "The bus stop didn't cause the guy to lose control, the bus didn't cause the guy to lose control.

"It just so happens that where this individual lost control there was a bus and a bus stop," Cassell said. "If you go off the road, if you hit the curb, collapse your tire and go off into the desert and hit a cactus, the media doesn't cover it but because there were people involved, people cover it."