A New Mexico man was killed in a single-vehicle crash in Cortez on Christmas Eve. The crash occurred near White Eagle Inn, 2110 S. Broadway, according to a recently released police report.
When Cortez Police officer Jason Giacchino arrived on the scene, the four-door sedan was lying on the roof, with the driver partially ejected from his side window. When officers reached the man, later identified as Jeremiah John Charles, he was unresponsive. and a pool of blood had formed in the vehicle.Pizza was in his mouth.
Emergency workers got a low-level pulse, but Charles was pronounced dead at the hospital.
Scattered around the crashed vehicle and to the road were bottles of alcohol. A glass marijuana pipe with burned marijuana residue inside was also found near the vehicle. Police found 24 50 milliliter shooters of Yukon Jack, four 100 ml of Yukon Jack, three sealed moonshine shooters and two 100 ml Yukon Jack bottles that were open and empty or nearly empty in the driver’s seat.
Sgt. Vance Carver spoke to two witnesses about the crash. The first witness, Bud Rockwell, saw the crash take place. Rockwell told Carver that the vehicle was going around the speed limit, approximately 60 to 70 mph, when it began swerving. Once it hit the ditch on the west side of the road, it rolled six to 10 times before coming to rest on its roof on the frontage road.
Piccadilly Pizza also was found at the crash scene, so Carver went to the Handy Mart on South Broadway to see whether the clerk had seen Charles before the crash.
The clerk, Shannon Smith, said Charles bought five pieces of pizza, a Hostess cupcake and a yellow lighter. After purchasing the items, he sat in his car for a while before leaving.
Smith told Carver she thought the man was “stoned” and had the “munchies.”
“It appears as if Jeremiah lost control of the vehicle as it was headed southbound on Hwy 160, roughly 150 feet north of White Eagle Inn,” Giacchino said in a report. “Jeremiah ended up overcorrecting a drift, which turned the vehicle backward before it skid off the road and into the ditch. Once in the ditch, the vehicle caught an edge and rolled over the wire fence approximately two or three times before completing a final half rotation and coming to rest in the frontage road northbound lane upside-down.”
