On Friday morning, while not on duty, an Albuquerque Police Department officer was charged with leaving the scene of a major accident.
APD says he hit a pedestrian on foot Thursday night at the corner of Central Avenue and Coors Boulevard while riding a motorbike very fast. The motorbike also had another police officer on it who wasn’t on duty at the time of the accident.
The police say that Ezekiel Florez, who is 29 years old, intentionally fled the scene of an accident while he was badly hurt. Florez has been put on administrative leave while the APD does a probe. The police say that Officer Krystal Garcia was riding with the motorbike when it crashed.
Witnesses say the person was running south across Central at the crosswalk when he was hit by a white motorbike with two people on it. The video security showed that the Central westbound light was on.
The investigation found that the motorbike was going too fast at the time of the accident. Even though it crashed, it kept going westward.
Later, Garcia, the police officer who was riding with Florez, told another officer about the accident. After that cop told a supervisor, investigators were called. Then Florez and Garcia came back to the scene and were arrested.
The unidentified guy on the sidewalk had head injuries that could have killed him. He was taken to a nearby hospital and is now in serious condition. Florez said that he saw the person running across the intersection, but he couldn’t move out of the way in time, so the pedestrian hit the right side of the motorbike.
APD says that investigators saw that Florez and Garcia didn’t go back to the spot of the accident for several hours after it happened and didn’t call for help. Garcia has been put on administrative leave, but he hasn’t been charged with a crime.
