Sooke RCMP say the driver who crashed into Dumont Tire on Otter Point Road Monday afternoon, seriously injuring one of its employees, was fleeing police who pulled her over for impaired driving minutes earlier.
Police later determined the woman was three times over the legal limit.
RCMP received a call Monday morning from someone who said a 40-year-old Sooke woman had taken a car without the owner’s consent and was driving drunk.
Five minutes later, police spotted the blue Toyota Solara convertible on Sooke Road. The officer tried to stop the car on Otter Point Road at Eustace Road just after 11 a.m.
The woman pulled over briefly and just as the officer was getting out of his vehicle, she fled the scene.
The driver sped down Otter Point Road about 90 metres until she swerved off the road and slammed into the parking lot of Dumont Tire near Ayres Road.
She hit a parked car, spinning it around 180 degrees and sending employee Mike Connors, who was standing by the parked car, flying through the air, according to manager Dennis Westendale.
Westendale said Connors, 43, was bleeding from the head, drifting in and out of consciousness and it was feared he had broken legs or a broken pelvis.
Four cars in total were damaged by the out of control driver, who was quickly arrested by Sooke RCMP. At the police station, the woman gave a breath sample three times the legal limit.
A traffic reconstructionist and the RCMP’s South Island Crash Team investigated until 7 p.m. Monday.
The woman faces charges of dangerous driving causing bodily harm, impaired driving causing bodily harm and driving with a blood alcohol level over the legal limit. She will appear in court June 3.
Westendale said Connor, in his early 40s, has worked at the shop the last five years and lived in Sooke his whole life. He has a wife and 10-year-old son.
Westendale said Monday he was flooded with calls from residents asking how Connor is doing. “Everybody is worried about him.”
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