Driver arrested, may have been impaired when car struck man, child in east valley

A man and a young child were hit by a car Thursday in an east valley school zone, and the child was left in life-threatening, critical condition, police said.

The crash happened in front of Snyder Elementary school, near the intersection of Charleston and Lamb boulevards, just after 2 p.m., and Metropolitan Police Department spokeswoman officer Laura Meltzer said the driver may have been impaired. The driver stayed at the scene, called police and was later taken into custody.

Brian Gillgren, 48, was in a Home Depot just west of the wreckage, and came out to see officers testing the driver's sobriety.

"He was standing on one foot, and he was pretty wobbly," Gillgren said, flailing his arms to act it out. He later saw officers handcuff the driver.

Both the man who was hit and the child were taken to University Medical Center. There was no immediate update on the man's condition, but the child's injuries were severe as of Thursday night.

Near the wreckage, there was no marked crosswalk, but the crash happened just in front of a bus stop. It was unclear whether the pair tried to cross the street from there.

At the scene, the car's hood had a deep dent down the middle and a spiderweb crack in the windshield. A pink stroller sat still nearby.

Southbound traffic on Lamb was shut down for about three hours between Charleston and Wyoming Avenue, which runs just south of Snyder Elementary School.

Snyder students were dismissed from school three minutes after the crash.

"He did hang around, which is a good thing; he didn't run," Gillgren said of the driver. "The part that bugged me was that he was smiling and laughing. You'd think even if you're drunk that kind of thing would sober you up."

— Contact Rachel Crosby at rcrosby@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5290. Find her on Twitter: @rachelacrosby Contact Max Michor at mmichor@reviewjournal.com or 702-381-3801. Find him on Twitter: @maxmichor