Woman critical after crash with police car

November 16, 2006|By FROM NEWS SERVICES

A 35-year-old Chicago woman remained in critical condition Wednesday evening and a Chicago police officer was discharged from the hospital after their cars collided in a morning crash on the city's South Side.

Police said the 14-year veteran was responding to a call of a person with a gun at about 7:40 a.m. Wednesday when the accident occurred at 79th Street and Loomis Boulevard.

The officer was headed west on 79th Street in his marked squad car and had emergency lights and sirens activated when a northbound car ran a red light at the intersection with Loomis, said police spokeswoman Monique Bond.

During the collision, the squad car broadsided the car, sending it spinning into a freestanding sign for a White Castle restaurant on the northwest corner of the intersection.

The woman, who was not wearing a seat belt, was pinned inside the car and had to be extricated by firefighters. She was taken in critical condition to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where she was in surgery Wednesday afternoon for life-threatening injuries, police said.

The officer was treated for scrapes and other injuries and released from the same hospital, police said. Both the officer and woman were alone in their vehicles at the time of the crash.