Followup: SW Holden car-vs.-house crash – plus a crash days earlier

Since that crash last Thursday, with a car hitting a house in the 1700 block of SW Holden, we have learned more about the circumstances and what happened to the driver who police say was to blame. And we’ve heard from someone else on the same street whose car was smashed by a different driver days earlier. Read on:

First, the Thursday morning crash in the 1700 block of SW Holden (map): The report wasn’t complete when we looked into it later that morning, but Seattle Police media-response unit Det. Jeff Kappel has just found it for us. He says the driver of the ’97 Honda Civic that hit the house was headed south on 19th SW, turning left to go eastbound on SW Holden, and ran the stop sign, hitting an ’05 Ford Explorer, then veering off the road, through a fence, and into the house. The Civic’s driver, Det. Kappel says, was cited for failure to stop. Nobody was seriously hurt. The home’s resident, Matt, later posted this photo on the West Seattle Blog Facebook page, labeling it, “Here is a photo of that car that ran into my house yesterday”:

Our initial report on the Thursday morning incident brought in a report from Marcy, who also lives on SW Holden in eastern West Seattle, and was also the victim of an early-morning crash earlier in the week. She says it happened the preceding Sunday morning, June 5th, at 4:40 am, in the 900 block of Holden (map). Here’s her car, followed by her story:

Our 2007 Volvo was totaled by a speeding car. Police say he hit hard enough to move our car 22 feet and our car hit our neighbor’s car. If that wasn’t enough, he tried to leave and his car lost all of its fluids so he decided it was a bright move to coast down Holden in neutral with no power, turn the corner on Highland Park Drive SW and coast backward (in the lanes coming up the hill) again, with no power.

The police response was swift and they ended up arresting him. …

I’m not sure what’s going on. Speed seems to be worse on Holden now more than ever and I can’t help but think it has something to do with the increased traffic in WS due to viaduct traffic…maybe be people looking for a shortcut??

I thought I’d let you know since it seems to be a small epidemic right now. Maybe increased speed patrols can come out of it, or more visibility at the very least. It is a really jarring thing to be minding your own business (in our case, sound asleep in bed) and have your property destroyed. Glad these incidents haven’t had injuries, but what’s next?

I am fortunate that we had great neighbors who heard our crash and were able to provide witness identification and witness accounts to the police.

After that first e-mail, Marcy got a copy of the police report, which shows the driver in the June 5th crash, a 42-year-old West Seattle man, was suspected of DUI and hit-and-run. Online jail/court records, however, are not showing what happened to him after the crash, though; we’re still trying to get that information.

2 Replies to "Followup: SW Holden car-vs.-house crash - plus a crash days earlier"

  • ellenater June 14, 2011 (11:42 am)

    Time to get those Darwin awards up and running again.

  • MJ June 23, 2011 (3:52 pm)

    Any update on what happened to the guy they arrested for hit & run and DUI? I’ve looked all over and can’t dig anything up.

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