Man gets into second DUI wreck after police fail to charge him with felony
| Wednesday, Sep 02 2009 06:47 PM
Last Updated Wednesday, Sep 02 2009 06:52 PM
Images
Casey Christie / The Californian Bakersfield firefighters quickly extinguished this car, after a multi-vehicle accident occured on Oak Street and 19th Streets, Wednesday morning.
Casey Christie / The Californian A Kern County Sheriff deputy and Hall Ambulance worker take care of one of several accident victims, Wednesday, on Oak Street, near 19th Street. One vehicle caught fire and was quickly extinguised by the Bakersfield Fire Department.
Casey Christie / The Californian Bakersfield Fire, Bakersfield Police, and Hall Ambulance personnel remove an accident victim from his vehicle, Wednesday morning at 19th and Oak Streets.
Casey Christie / The Californian Bakersfield Firefighters, Bakersfield Police and Hall Ambulance personnel remove one of several accident victims from his vehicle, Wednesday morning on Oak Street and 19th Street. At least two victims were transported to local hospitals.
Bakersfield police may have mistakenly given a drunken driver suspect, who hurt someone two weeks ago, a chance to commit the same crime Wednesday.
A crash Wednesday caused by William Jarone Green, 32, was the third time this year that Green was arrested on driving under the influence charges, court records say.
He was also stopped two other times for driving without a license, the records said.
Green was arrested Aug. 19 after he allegedly was driving drunk, crashed through a fence at South High School, sped across the football field and struck a woman, sending her to a hospital, police reported.
Those circumstances -- driving drunk and injuring someone -- make drunken driving a felony. But police booked him into jail on misdemeanor charges.
He posted the relatively low misdemeanor bail and went out driving again.
Police said Wednesday the reason they chose to book him on a misdemeanor is because Green claimed to have had a seizure and the woman initially only complained of pain.
A blood sample was taken from Green and if it showed drugs influenced his driving, the police were going to seek felony charges, Detective Mary DeGeare said. Police also learned the woman's injuries were more serious than the officer was first told.
However, a police news release issued on Aug. 19, a couple hours after the accident, said the woman had been taken to the hospital with "moderate injuries."
A prosecutor tried to get Green off the street this week by refiling felony charges against him. But Deputy District Attorney Scott Spielman said it turned out he "was a day late."
Spielman got a phone call Friday from someone asking about the South High case. The prosecutor told the caller he was sure Green would have a felony prosecution.
But when Spielman checked, he saw that Green had only been charged with the misdemeanor and was out of jail.
Spielman upgraded the charges to a felony case on Tuesday. He called the police on Wednesday to tell them to arrest Green on a new $50,000 warrant in the South High case.
That's when he discovered Green was already jail after another DUI crash Wednesday morning.
Now Green's bail is $300,000, at the request of police.
In the latest wreck, Green was driving west on 19th Street at 9:34 a.m. when he failed to stop for a red light at Oak Street and crashed into a Cadillac CTS driven by 56-year-old Nelson Cumbry Jr.
Crumby's car burst into flames and struck a commercial van driven by 51-year-old Thomas Myers. Crumby suffered moderate injuries and was taken to Kern Medical Center. Myers complained of pain.
Green was first charged with misdemeanor drunken driving in April and was set to go to trial on Aug. 24. But because of the new South High case, the April case was delayed to Oct. 2 for the possibility of settling both cases at once, Spielman said.
