Garden Prairie accident - 1 ticket (so far)

Gus Philpott
Woodstock Advocate
December 3, 2009

On November 17, 22-year-old James L. Taylor, II, of Marengo, was tuning his MP-3 and ran off Route 20, seriously injuring Don Pilgrim of Garden Prairie.

Taylor was issued a ticket for driving with no insurance, and the Boone County State's Attorney's Office is determining whether any other charges are to be filed. Taylor's first court date on the no-insurance ticket comes up on December 17 at 8:30AM.

Additional tickets here look like a no-brainer to me. The driver was distracted and ran off the left side of the roadway, hitting and nearly killing a man in his own yard. The photo in Tuesday's Northwest Herald showed Pilgrim on a respirator, mentioned both lungs are collapsed and indicated that he may never walk again,

Five days after the accident the reporting officer talked to a witness who said that Pilgrim had been pushed (by the car) under a trailer parked in his yard and then out to the side of the trailer. The last line in the report, which had to be written on or after the sentence added on Nov. 22, reads, "Unit 1 advised R/o he had 2 drinks, 2 hours prior, no food all day. Doctor thinks he could be hyperglycemic."

If a person has a medical condition, known or unknown, doesn't eat all day, admits to two drinks (presumed alcoholic) by 2:30PM and blacks out two hours later while driving, isn't he still responsible for causing a serious-injury accident?

Will the Boone County SAO release Taylor's BAC? Will they charge him with moving violations? Driving left of the center line? Failure to stay in lane? Careless driving? Will the BAC justify impaired driving charges?