Hey, remember the pre-St. Patrick's Day, anti-DUI operations we warned you were happening throughout Orange County this past weekend? Checkpoints and special patrols may have blanketed local streets but they did not stop some DUI-related carnage on our freeways.
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A hit-and-run with DUI suspect on the 91 freeway in Fullerton briefly commandeered a California Highway Patrol vehicle and escaped before being re-captured Friday evening, according to authorities.
John Larry Perryman III, 23, of San Bernardino, darted off on foot from the scene of a four-vehicle collision he allegedly caused on the eastbound lanes of the 91 around 4:30 p.m. He was found on Magnolia Avenue, where he was handcuffed, placed in the rear of a Westminster California Highway Patrol (CHP) vehicle and driven back to the crash scene.
After the CHP officers got out of their patrol car to complete their investigation, Perryman allegedly climbed into the driver seat and sped off. But the vehicle was tracked via its GPS to Whittier, where Perryman is accused of again having made a run for it before being nabbed for good around 6:20 p.m. and charged with DUI, hit-and-run, resisting arrest, evading and theft of a vehicle.
Then on Saturday morning, Rebecca Munoz, 22, of Santa Ana, was driving a white 2014 BMW 320i that rear ended a silver 2002 Jeep Liberty on the westbound 22 freeway around 1:45 a.m. Saturday, according to the CHP.
The SUV went over a cement barrier, overturned and landed on its roof on The City Drive westbound onramp of the 57 freeway. A passenger inside, Eric Phan, 34, of Midway City, was pronounced dead at the scene. Driver Neil Raboy, 36, of Huntington Beach, suffered
major head trauma injuries and was taken to UCI Medical Center in Orange.
Munoz, who suffered no injuries, but was booked on suspicion of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and was held in lieu of $100,000 bail pending a court appearance scheduled for Tuesday.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.