ST. GEORGE — Two men fled the scene of an alcohol-related crash Saturday morning causing a helicopter search, multiple charges and resulting in two arrests.
According to the probable cause statement filed in Utah’s 5th District Court by the Utah Highway Patrol, dispatch received a call regarding a reckless driver on Interstate 15 in Iron County, at approximately 7:14 a.m.
The caller stated that a white Ford Expedition was traveling southbound on I-15 near mile marker 49. The caller reported the vehicle as “all over the road,” nearly sideswiping other motorists and threatening the safety of other vehicles.
Less than five minutes later on southbound 1-15, at approximately mile marker 44, the vehicle ran off the left side of the road, causing the vehicle to roll. Once the vehicle came to a stop, the driver, later identified as 22-year-old Ethan Mathis, and 20-year-old passenger Bryton Nicholson, ran from the vehicle heading east.
Both subjects climbed a deer fence and hid in nearby bushes and trees to avoid apprehension by law enforcement. The Division of Public Safety’s Star 9 helicopter assisted in the search for the fleeing men along with the Utah Highway Patrol and the Division of Wildlife Resources.
“When I arrived at the scene with the vehicle I found that there was open containers in the vehicle,” the UHP trooper wrote in the statement supporting the arrests.
Based on the crash occurring on a straight section of the road, alcohol tests and the driver’s own admission, it is believed that Mathis was highly intoxicated at the time of the crash.
“I checked his eyes and they were extremely red, bloodshot and glassy,” the trooper stated. “He also smelled heavily of an alcoholic beverage.”
Mathis was transported to the Cedar City Hospital and evaluated by medical staff, then transported to the jail in Iron County. Charges include leaving the scene of a crash, property damage, driving under the influence, open alcohol containers/drinking alcohol in the vehicle and failure to operate within a single lane.
Due to fleeing the scene of the accident and field tests confirming his intoxication, Nicholson was also detained and booked on charges of leaving the scene of a crash, consuming alcohol as a minor, having an open container and public intoxication.
The scene was less than within ten miles, and ten minutes, of a fatal crash that occurred on the frontage road paralleling I-15, known as Old Highway 91. In that case, St. George News previously reported at 19-year-old man was pronounced dead at the scene after an early morning head-on collision.
Utah Highway Patrol Public Affairs Officer Luis Silva Santisteban told St. George News that the two incidents were not related.
This report is based on statements from court records, police or other responders and may not contain the full scope of findings.
St. George News reporter Stephanie DeGraw contributed to this report.
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