Indiana’s law requiring motorists to move over for emergency vehicles is being highlighted after two separate crashes over the weekend struck Indiana State troopers, severely injuring one in Indianapolis.
Within a one mile of each other and in the span of nine hours, two state trooper vehicles and one officer were struck by motorists as they parked on the shoulder. In one crash, 22-year-old Trooper Azariah Keith was critically injured after an alleged impaired driver hit him on I-65 near 30th and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. streets.
Keith, a one-year veteran of the police force, was helping a stranded driver change tires amid freezing conditions when he was struck about 9:30 p.m. Saturday. The SUV that hit him had traveled across the left lane, struck the median and hit the trooper. Police officials said the impact with the median likely reduced the speed of the vehicle, but the force remained enough for Keith to suffer a broken pelvis, broken left fibula and lacerated knee joint in his leg.