The horrifying and violent incident that saw a man drive his car through a crowd of people at the Martinsville Speedway has started to begin its legal process, and as part of that, the local police department has issued a statement full of new information.
At Sunday’s NASCAR race, events nearly came to a screeching halt as a driver broke away from normal traffic patterns when he tried to overtake a Jeep vehicle in traffic. His vehicle, a Chevrolet SSR convertible sport pickup, plowed through a crowd of pedestrians – injuring 22 people. Luckily there were no fatalities.
Surprisingly, through the Virginia State Police’s statement, the unidentified male driver was arrested on a ‘reckless driving’ charge and later arraigned in court late Sunday and bond for the driver was set at a paltry $7,500.
“State police are still working to determine the exact cause of the crashes and additional charges are pending consultation with Henry County Commonwealth’s Attorney Andrew Nester,” VSP Spokesperson Corinne Geller explained to USA Today.
Bystander Roger Wolfe captured several photographs of the aftermath and spoke to USA Today about the situation on the ground in Martinsville on Sunday.
“You could hear the screams for help. They must have had 15, 20 police cars and ambulances down there. The guy who got ran over had a sheet up to his neck. I figured he was pretty bad off.”
The police spokesperson has stated that they do not believe alcohol to be a contributing factor to the terrifying events that unfolded. At the time of this writing, no further information on the suspect’s court appearance is available.
Watch the segment from USA Today below.