Jon Johnson File Photo/Gila Herald: The driver in a rollover crash off Solomon Road on Tuesday had multiple drugs in her system and reportedly fell asleep at the wheel.
Woman flown to UMC for fractured back/DUI charges pending lab results
By Jon Johnson
GRAHAM COUNTY – A woman who rolled her car off Solomon Road on Tuesday had a variety of legal and illegal drugs in her system.
According to a toxicology report from the Mt. Graham Regional Medical Center (MGRMC), a blood sample from the driver, Carrie Coleman, tested positive for cannabinoids, opiates, Oxycodone, Benzodiazepine, and amphetamine. Coleman reported she has a prescription for morphine and 15-mg Oxycodone pills and that she had taken both that morning. Coleman’s driver’s license information stated she had a previous DUI and was required to have an ignition interlock device. The vehicle she was driving is registered to a man in Mesa, and the Sheriff’s Office report did not mention it having such a device installed.
First-responders were dispatched to the scene roughly half a mile west of the intersection with Barney Lane at about 2:50 p.m. and located a white, Ford Focus in a cotton field. The farmer who handles the field would later advise the damage to the cotton was about $300.
Coleman said she was eastbound on Solomon Road when her 6-year-old son asked her a question. She said she looked back to answer him and then accidentally ran off the road and flipped the car. Coleman was not wearing her seatbelt, but her son and 8-year-old daughter, who were both in the rear of the vehicle, were reportedly buckled in their seatbelts. The children only suffered minor injuries.
The daughter told a deputy that her mother had worked a night shift and had fallen asleep at the wheel. She said she saw Coleman’s eyes shut while driving and then mimed how Coleman allegedly swerved back and forth a few times with her eyes shut before running off the road and rolling the vehicle into the cotton field.
While being examined at MGRMC, it was learned that Coleman had a fractured back, and she was flown to Banner-University Medical Center Tucson for treatment.
Deputies located several prescription pill bottles in and out of the car, as well as a medical marijuana container in the center console with cannabis inside.
The investigating deputy deemed the crash occurred due to inattentiveness or because Coleman fell asleep at the wheel.
Aggravated DUI charges against Coleman are pending lab test results, according to the Sheriff’s Office report.
