Hillsborough deputy recounts terrifying I-75 patrol car crash
Corporal Niomi Bruce was left with bruising, whiplash, and muscle damage after being hit by a driver investigating a separate incident.
By Rebecca Dawson ·
A Hillsborough County deputy was left with bruising, whiplash, and muscle damage after being hit by a driver investigating a separate incident. Corporal Niomi Bruce was among the deputies who responded to help secure a crash scene on I-75 when a vehicle hit her patrol car while she was investigating a completely separate incident.
It all started as a traffic stop for a vehicle swerving out of its lane on Monday, October 19 around 10 p.m. Instead of stopping, the vehicle fled, investigators told FOX 13. HCSO’s Aviation Unit tracked the vehicle to I-75, eventually watching as it moved off the road and into a construction zone.
Bruce was sitting inside her patrol vehicle waiting for a tow truck and speaking with her sergeant through the passenger window. She suffered a lower back tear, bruising, whiplash, and muscle damage. Thankfully, the loss of feeling in her lower extremities was temporary, and she has since been released from the hospital.
Newly released body camera footage and 911 audio capture the moments her colleagues rushed in to help. In the video, Bruce can be heard telling fellow deputies that she could not feel her legs. It could have been a lot worse, and that was probably the one moment in her career that could have really changed her life, her husband's life, and her kids' lives.
Florida's Move Over law requires drivers to move over one lane or slow down to 20 miles per hour below the posted speed limit if they see any vehicle stopped on the side of the road with its hazard lights on, emergency flares, or visible emergency signage.
Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister said that when he gets a call in the middle of the night that a deputy was in a traffic crash and can't feel their lower extremities, his heart breaks, his heart drops, and he has that moment of panic because he sees all 4,500 employees as members of a family.
The 21-year-old driver who struck Bruce was cited for careless driving. The four individuals inside the vehicle in the initial rollover crash were all arrested and are now facing a slew of traffic and drug-related charges.
Source: FOX 13 Tampa Bay
