SAVANNAH, Ga. – A Savannah Police officer allegedly backed into a citizen’s car last month during the pursuit of a suspect, leading to the driver being hospitalized.
That citizen, Darnell Thomas, is now speaking out about the incident exclusively with . Our crew walked the scene of the crash with him.
“As I was driving down 40th Street, I turned left onto this street here,” Thomas recounted. “When I reached around 39th Street, I noticed a lot of flashing lights ahead, and I knew something was happening.”
He pointed to a Munchie’s parking lot on 38th Street as the location where officers had been gathered.
“The officer turned right from 38th Street,” Thomas explained. “I continued cautiously, but then he suddenly stopped. As I was crossing 38th Street, he threw his car into reverse. When I realized this, I attempted to reverse my own car. I was probably trailing him by about three or four car lengths.”
That’s when he said the officer “smashed” the front of his car on Martin Luther King Boulevard.
According to Thomas, the officer appeared to be pursuing someone who had fled from where the SPD cars were originally gathered.
A police report obtained by describes the damage to his vehicle as “disabling.”
“My car is totaled,” he said. “I bought it like two weeks ago. So, it only had 1,300 miles on it. So, that was a waste of, kind of hurtful.”
Thomas was brought to the emergency room following the incident. Since then, he said he has been receiving treatment in physical therapy.
“EMS was there. When I was able to get out of the car, that’s when I kind of felt my body go numb, my back, kind of shaken up a little bit,” he said.
According to the police report, the officer who backed up received no citations.
“I know they respond to emergencies and things of that nature, but at the end of the day, public safety, they need to be more aware of that too because that could have been a pedestrian. I could have been out there just walking,” he said.
