(Jacob Bruns, Headline USA) Five people were crushed and severely injured after they were hanging out of an sport-utility vehicle while the driver did donuts and eventually flipped the car onto them in a Colorado Springs parking lot, the Daily Mail reported.
Police arrived at the strip-mall parking lot scene late Saturday night, soon after the car flipped, and found all five people in dire condition. They were sent to the hospital, and their status remained unknown as of Tuesday morning.
The car was seen driving at high speeds through the parking lot, with some people hanging out the SUV’s sunroof and others out the side windows.
Then, the car abruptly slowed down and turned, causing it to tip and crushing two people who were hanging out the side with the full weight of the vehicle.
The other three were thrown from the car.
In the aftermath, groups of people rushed up to try to help get some out from underneath the vehicle.
As onlookers frantically tried to roll the vehicle back to its upright position, one person on the other side called out, “There’s someone on the other side, don’t flip it!”
Instead they tried to raise the entire vehicle, likely weighing anywhere between 2 and 3 tons.
“Lift it, lift it, lift, it,” one person said, while another added, “push up.”
In another harrowing moment, someone says that the car appears to be leaking fluids, although, thankfully, there was no explosion reported.
The SUV driver, Marisol Wentling, sustained no serious injuries and was taken to jail Sunday night on a count of reckless driving. She has been released on bond.
According to police, the incident remains under investigation, and they are urging anyone who knows what was going on to come forward.
The incident may or may not have been connected to a series of “street takeovers” that occurred throughout the nation over the weekend, including one in Colorado Springs.
In Connecticut, one street takeover culminated in fireworks being thrown at police officers. Street takeovers were orchestrated in both Derby and New Haven, and police suggested that they were coordinated by the same group, which brought in cars with out-of-state licenses.
However, Francis Barclay, who works for Jolly Christmas Trees, selling Christmas trees in the same parking lot where the crash took place, said that similar incidents had occurred in the past, and the problem appeared to be getting worse, KRDO reported.
“It seems to me, since I’ve been doing this for five years, it’s getting more and more frequent,” Barclay said.
“It’s been like every third or fourth night out here, there’s somebody out here squealing tires,” he added. “I see a lot of activity.”
