Arrest report for suspect in Las Vegas New Year’s crash IDs officers hit
The two Las Vegas police officers who were hit in a suspected DUI crash early New Year’s Day were named in arresting documents for the man police believe was behind the wheel.
The arrest report for Jonathan Kim, 27, identified the injured officer as “J. Bozarth” and the uninjured officer as “M. Ware.”
Although Metro could not confirm the first names of the officers Friday, public salary records show the injured officer is officer Jeremy D. Bozarth. The uninjured officer’s name is Matthew J. Ware, according to a roster of Metro employees obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal in 2016.
Officers Ware and Bozarth were investigating a separate DUI crash about 4:30 a.m. Jan. 1 on Paradise Road, north of Corporate Drive, when they were hit, according to the arrest report.
Ware’s police motorcycle and Bozarth’s patrol car were parked in the far left lane, with their lights flashing, staggered so that the motorcycle was behind the patrol vehicle, the report said. Ware was standing about 3 feet to the left of his motorcycle as Bozarth got out of the driver side of his car and walked toward Ware.
The report said Kim was traveling south on Paradise in the same lane when his car struck the back end of Ware’s motorcycle and Ware’s right leg. Ware’s motorcycle was pushed into Bozarth, who was knocked to the ground.
The car Kim drove continued south on Paradise, striking Bozarth’s vehicle before stopping, the report said.
A man who had been arrested after the earlier suspected DUI crash was in the back seat of the patrol car when it was hit. He was not injured, the report said.
Kim, who had not been wearing his seat belt when the crash happened, was shuffling through paperwork trying to find his registration and insurance when the investigating officer approached his car, according to the report.
“Kim appeared to be confused” and “had bloodshot and watery eyes,” the officer wrote in his report.
The officer smelled a strong odor of alcohol on Kim’s breath when he spoke, and Kim admitted that he had two beers before driving the car, according to the arrest report. He failed two field sobriety tests and was arrested, the report said.
Bozarth was taken to Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center with “substantial injuries,” which resulted in “the prolonged loss of the use of a limb or limbs,” the report said.
Metro spokesman Aden OcampoGomez could not confirm Friday whether the injured officer had been released from the hospital but said he was “stable.”
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Contact Kimber Laux at klaux@reviewjournal.com. Follow @lauxkimber on Twitter.
