Bad Weather Gives Free Pass to Hit-and-Run Hummer

This morning, January 6, the Westminster Police Department, like many law enforcement agencies across the metro area, is on accident-alert status because of snowy, icy road conditions. On Twitter, the WPD encourages people to report “injury accidents,” as well as “accidents where one or more of the vehicles involved cannot be driven, accidents involving damage to city, state/federal property, accidents involving drivers under the influence of alcohol or drugs” and “hit & run accidents just occurred w/suspect info.” For all other crashes, drivers are told to “file a report online.”

But as Melanie Sheree discovered, the WPD wants very specific “suspect info” for hit-and-run accidents. On January 2, in conditions much like those around Denver right now, the Boulder resident was the victim of a hit-and-run that caused major damage to her partner’s truck. But because she wasn’t able to see the license plate number of the Hummer H2 that smashed into her, Westminster police aren’t investigating the incident, despite the very strong possibility that easily accessible video could allow investigators to find the suspect.

“It just feels like the system is broken,” she says.

The incident took place on southbound Federal Boulevard approaching 80th Avenue.

“It was about 4:05 in the morning,” Sheree recalls, “and I was heading home. I had happened to take my partner’s truck that night to drive because of how bad the roads were, since the vehicle’s four-wheel drive. I was heading down Federal on a little hill, and this silver Hummer-type truck got behind me. I was going pretty slow in the right-hand lane because of how slick it was, and I think they were trying to pass me. They sped up on the hill and lost control.”

She knew impact was imminent, but “there’s no way you can really prepare yourself for something like that,” she says. “I grabbed the steering wheel really tight and I remember saying to myself, ‘Oh, shit.’ And they hit me really hard. … The truck bed kind of went off its frame and into the cab a little bit, and the hatch broke on the tailgate. But the bed is what saved me.”

The accident “kind of happened in an intersection,” Sheree continues, “and since it was so slippery, I thought it would be better to get out of the road, so I pulled into a Conoco gas station — and they followed me. I thought, ‘Okay, we’re going to exchange information.’ But I was shook up, and I took a moment to take a few deep breaths in the truck — and when I got out to talk to this person, they backed out and drove away.”

Shortly after the Hummer disappeared, Sheree phoned the Westminster Police Department. “They basically told me that since I didn’t have license plate information and the weather was so bad, they couldn’t do anything — and they wouldn’t be coming out to take an official report,” she recalls. And when she subsequently asked if she could file a criminal complaint, she says she was told that “the best I could do was file an accident report through the DMV, which does absolutely nothing. It would be solely for insurance purposes.”

Investigator Cheri Spottke, a spokesperson for the WPD, confirms Sheree’s account. “The only suspect information she could provide was a silver Hummer,” she notes. “Our accident alert policy states that if there isn’t a license plate, we refer them to the state website to file a report. This is so there is documentation of the accident for insurance purposes. There is nothing more an officer would do or be able to do in this instance.”

Spottke explains that “the purpose of accident alert is due to the sheer number of accidents. It frees up officers to respond to the more serious injury accident or those accidents with suspect information. … We understand Ms. Sheree’s frustration, but there isn’t anything for the police to follow up on.”

That’s not quite right. Sheree, who experienced significant body soreness from the speed of the impact and whiplash effects, correctly suspected that the Conoco was outfitted with cameras, “and I thought they could look at the footage,” she says. “But they won’t release the footage to me. They’ll only release the footage to the police, but the police told me that I couldn’t get it, because I didn’t have any of the information that they would need.”

With nowhere else to turn, Sheree recorded a video that she’s posted to various social media sites asking for help locating a Hummer with a battered front end:

There’s another problem, too: Sheree’s partner had tried paying his insurance premium using the company’s app, but it didn’t go through because of an apparent glitch, she says. As a result, he was uninsured at the time of the accident and will likely have to pay to repair the truck himself.

“It’s just bad all around,” Sheree confesses. “It makes me feel that if it’s that bad out, it’s not worth risking your life, especially for people who are out there in a smaller car. It could have been someone in a small sedan that got hit, or somebody walking outside, and that person would have just driven away.”

As for the Hummer driver, “there have been no repercussions,” she says. “Hit-and-runs are supposed to be a felony, so I can’t understand how there’s no followup. It just seems wrong — really messed up.”