Early Thursday morning after last call, a 23-year-old woman with at least three prior DUI charges to her name decided to go for one more when she steered her Jeep Cherokee up a Highway 80 onramp that was closed for construction. A CHP officer saw the woman make the wrong turn around 2 a.m. and gave chase as she blew past the Ninth Street offramp and exited towards Mission and South Van Ness, where she stupidly tried to evade capture by turning off her headlights. She then proceeded to smash into things while doing a couple laps around 17th Street.
The triple (now quadruple) DUI suspect hit a parked car at 15th and Natoma so hard that it slid into a pedestrian who had been walking his bike on the sidewalk. In an apparent attempt to ditch the CHP crusier, the woman went around the block near 17th and South Van Ness twice, but she probably wasn't too hard to follow since she left an impressive trail of damage in her wake. According to authorities on the scene, the woman "hit a truck, crashed through a traffic light pole, smashed into a fence and struck a van before coming to a stop." Traffic lights in the area were still out of service later this morning.
Since the woman was clearly in no shape to drive home, she had to be taken away from the scene in an ambulance and was reportedly suffering from some undisclosed minor injuries. The bicyclist from 15th and Natoma also had to be taken to the hospital to be treated for minor injuries.
The driver, indentified as 23-year-old Cerena Barros of Santa Cruz faces her fourth DUI charge, with enhancements from the previous three, plus charges for the hit-and-run action and evading police. She was also booked on charges of driving with a suspended license, possession of a controlled substance and driving under the influence of a controlled substance. As of Thursday afternoon she was still in custody on $226,000 bail.
ABC7 has the video report:
[KTVU]
[MissionLocal]
[ABC7]