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DAYTON — Greg A. Hudson told police he saw a construction worker wearing a bright green shirt or vest “a split second” before the GMC Jimmy he was driving struck the man on Interstate 75.
Hudson “heard the crack of the passenger mirror,” he wrote in a statement to police on July 10, the day of the accident.
He then drove away as injured worker Holdurige “Hob” Workman lay motionless against an interstate divider wall, drifting in and out of consciousness following the 4:25 a.m. crash, according to police.
Hudson continued out of the restricted construction zone and headed north on I-75 for more than a mile while being pursued by Bob Roach, Workman’s construction supervisor who had witnessed the accident. With his truck’s lights flashing, Roach chased after the SUV.
What happened on the interstate that morning — and in the months that followed as the case worked its way through the judicial system — outrages Workman and Roach and raises questions about why there weren’t more serious consequences for the driver.
“I thought the law protected people,” said Workman, who receives workers’ compensation due to the neck and back injuries he suffered. Unable to work for nearly nine months, he has since lost his insurance coverage for any health problems that are not related to the accident.
A Montgomery County grand jury on Dec. 11 chose not to indict Hudson on a charge of vehicular assault, a fourth-degree felony that carries a maximum penalty of six to 18 months in prison. Jurors apparently were not convinced that Hudson acted recklessly, said Debra Armanini, first assistant prosecutor for the Montgomery County Prosecutor’s Office.
Armanini did not handle the case but reviewed the file at the request of the Dayton Daily News. She said one problem involves the limitations of a 2004 state law that specifies jail time for leaving an accident scene when someone is hurt or killed. The way the law is written, she said, implies that the act of fleeing the scene has to cause injury or death.
If the legislature’s intent was to make it a felony for anyone leaving the scene, “they didn’t do that,” Armanini said.
John Murphy, executive director of the Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association in Columbus, called it a “flaw in the statute.”
“We missed it and everyone missed it and we haven’t got it corrected yet,” he said.
Still, Murphy said Ohio law provides for a first-degree misdemeanor for leaving the scene, which carries a possible maximum penalty of six months in jail. That charge was never filed. After the grand jury returned no indictment, Dayton Chief Prosecutor Stephanie Cook approved a minor misdemeanor charge, according to an investigation report from Dayton Police Detective Greg Jackson. She rejected the filing of a more serious misdemeanor of “hit-skip filing,” Jackson wrote in the report.
Cook refused to comment on the case.
Workman and Roach called the outcome outrageous, saying it makes a mockery out of signs posted in construction zones warning of double fines for speeding and mandatory jail for causing injuries or death.
Workman still has a copy of the 911 tape that he requested following the accident. It captures Roach pursuing the Jimmy up the interstate and then cornering him until law enforcement arrived.
“I wanted to hear what my fellow worker did for me,” Workman said. “He could have stayed at the scene. He didn’t. He didn’t want this guy to get away.”
‘I was freaking and in a panic’
Hudson did not respond to a request for comment. But his written police statement portrays an image of a confused driver who panicked after hitting Workman and couldn’t find a place to pull over.
The statement played a crucial role in grand jurors determining he was not reckless, Armanini said.
Hudson said he and two friends had visited a gentlemen’s club south of Dayton, where he drank three beers. He was driving home to Troy when he got “turned around” downtown trying to get back to I-75 North, he said. He said he entered the interstate at Third Street and was traveling 50 to 55 mph when he “clipped the cone,” as he watched out for construction workers on the road’s left shoulder. “I was watching the guys on my left when one came out of nowhere to the right and I heard the crack of the passenger mirror,” he said in his statement.
“I was just freaking and in a panic. I didn’t know what to do other than get out of everybody’s way and off the interstate.”
Police say Hudson hit Workman after driving into a restricted area. Hudson said he then tried to brake but couldn’t find a place to pull over. “I started freaking yelling at both my friends: ‘Can I get over? Can I get over?’ ”
He said he tried to get off at the next exit — Main Street — but it was closed “so I took the next one which I believe was Keowee.”
Roach doesn’t believe Hudson.
“He’s full of crap,” said Roach, a traffic control supervisor for All Seasons Contracting Co. in Cleveland. “If I hit a man on the highway, I’m finding a place to pull over. I’m not going to keep driving.”
Roach believes Hudson was trying to flee. Workman was struck just as the crew started “backing down” the construction zone after finishing for the night, Roach said. Workman and another employee, David Bates, were moving cones and barrels to the side as Roach, with his truck in reverse, flanked them in an effort to shield the workers from oncoming traffic.
Hudson and the Jimmy appeared in a flash.
“As he swerved around me, Hob was walking a cone over to the shoulder of the road,” Roach said. “That’s when he hit Hob.”
Said Workman: “I (saw) a headlight and a fender. That’s all I remember.”
Roach said he yelled to Bates to stay with Workman while he called 911 and then tried to catch the SUV. Two other motorists, apparently realizing what had happened, got in front of Hudson’s vehicle and helped slow it down, according to Roach.
“They stayed in front of him long enough for me to catch up with him,” he said. “That gave me time to get to his license plate.”
Roach said he didn’t bump Hudson’s vehicle but “nudged” him off the exit at Keowee. The Jimmy turned right and “it didn’t appear he was going to stop,” Roach said. He swung his truck around and cut him off, forcing him into a parking lot and against a building near Keowee Street and Hunter Avenue.
Roach’s tirade is captured on the 911 tape.
“I don’t know what happened,” Hudson is heard saying.
Spotty record
Hudson told police he had stopped drinking at midnight and “felt no effects of the alcohol.”
He passed both a field sobriety test and a breathalyzer, according to police.
But just 11 days before the crash, Hudson was arrested in Troy and charged with misdemeanor counts of possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia after an officer found a bag of marijuana and rolling papers on him.
And in January 2009 — six months before the crash — he was arrested for operating a motor vehicle under the influence in Troy after a state highway patrol trooper noticed the car he was driving, a Nissan Pathfinder, was stuck in the snow.
The trooper said Hudson’s eyes appeared “glassy and bloodshot,” and he found a half empty 12-ounce Budweiser beer bottle next to the driver’s seat, according to an incident report.
Hudson told him he had consumed three beers and was coming from a bar. He passed a field sobriety test but tested 0.112 on an alcohol breath test, above the legal limit.
His license was suspended, but he regained limited driving privileges in February, when his charge was reduced. He regained full driving privileges on April 29.
His legal problems would continue.
Hudson faced no charges in connection with the I-75 crash until December. But in the interim, on Aug. 6, he lost his license again after pleading guilty to the drug charges in Miami County Municipal Court. The judge gave him 30 days in jail for possession of drug paraphernalia but suspended that sentence. Instead, he was given two years probation and 40 hours of community service.
His driver’s license was suspended through Feb. 1.
He hung onto it for barely a month.
‘I’m taking a big loss’
On Jan. 26, Hudson pleaded no contest to a single minor misdemeanor of failing to maintain reasonable control of the Jimmy.
Asked by Dayton Municipal Court Magistrate Colette Moorman if he had anything to add to the facts, Hudson said no.
She found him guilty and fined him $100 plus court costs.
The hearing did lead to him losing his driver’s license again. Hudson told Moorman he had insurance at the time of the crash but said he didn’t have his card with him. She instructed him to bring it into the clerk’s office before the ticket was to be sent to the Bureau of Motor Vehicles.
On March 12, the BMV suspended his license for three months. Hudson apparently never provided proof that he had insurance on July 10, 2009, the day he drove into the path of a man who had spent 13 years in a job he loved.
Workman continues to go to physical therapy on Mondays and Wednesdays. He describes his most serious injuries as two bulging disks in his neck, a torn ligament in his left shoulder and a torn left calf muscle.
He has not returned to work.
In addition to his physical injuries, he’s been hurt financially. He receives workers’ compensation every two weeks, but it’s only 62 percent of his pay.
“I’m taking a big loss not working every week,” said Workman, who is married with a grown son.
Though workers’ compensation covers his medical expenses tied to the accident, he has lost his health insurance and prescription coverage set up through his union because he didn’t work enough hours last year.
“Anything that didn’t involve the accident,” he said, “I will pay out of pocket full price.”
He worries about whether he’ll be able to do construction work again. Even simple tasks like raking or taking out the trash aggravate his injuries.
Still, he’s not giving up.
“I loved that kind of work,” he said. “You get to tear something apart and put it back better than it was.”
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2094 or mkissell@DaytonDailyNews.com.
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