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Drivers Cited For Crashes On I-4 Westbound

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By KEITH MORELLI, The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 12, 2008

Updated: 01/12/2008 12:33 am

TAMPA - In dense fog and smoke on a rural stretch of Interstate 4, a slightly injured Wilfredo Reveron tried to help.

The Orlando electrician was headed to a job in Tampa on Wednesday when he ended up in the Polk County pileup. Four people died, 38 were injured and Reveron did what he could to help, including translating Spanish for Florida Highway Patrol troopers.

"The trooper was going from car to car, talking to drivers, getting information and how much damage was done," Reveron's wife, Cecilia, said from her home Friday. "Then, at the end, the trooper said to my husband, 'OK, here's your ticket.'"

Reveron, his wife said, was shocked.

"He got a ticket for careless driving."

The trooper told Reveron he was just doing his job and that if he wanted to contest the $121 citation he could take it to court.

She said several drivers were given tickets. Her husband plans to contest the citation.

Florida Highway Patrol Trooper Larry Coggins did not talk about Reveron's case specifically but defended the decision to issue tickets. They went to drivers involved in eight minor accidents. Some drivers, Coggins said, were not driving safely under the conditions at the time.

No drivers involved in the first, most serious chain-reaction crashes were cited, Coggins said. All the deaths occurred in this fiery, pre-dawn pileup of 43 vehicles in I-4's eastbound lanes.

"My troopers were out there helping people in the fire," he said, "and they hear bang, bang, bang on the side."

The time was about 6 a.m., an hour after the first collisions, and across the median, in the westbound lanes. Motorists there found themselves in a kind of traffic chaos under the same blinding conditions that caused the initial pileup.

Most managed to negotiate safely through the stream of emergency vehicles, some of which were trying to reach the scene by driving the wrong way. Motorists also faced rescue workers on foot and other traffic.

Some of these motorists, though, ended up crashing as they attempted to maneuver out of the mess.

"All the people who got cited were involved in accidents," Coggins said.

Coggins said emergency workers and troopers were concentrating on the fires and victims in the eastbound lanes so they did not try to direct westbound vehicles.

When vehicles began crashing in the westbound lanes, rescue workers had to pull away and provide aid over there, Coggins said.

Troopers issued citations because the drivers had failed to operate their vehicles in a manner safe enough, given the conditions, to avoid a crash, Coggins said.

"Thousands of other vehicle drivers were careful enough to get away," he said. "They were getting through with no problem. They were going slowly, with no crashes."

Those who got tickets face not only the fine but also four points on their driving records, said Tampa defense lawyer Ty Trayner, who represents accused traffic offenders in Hillsborough County, "and that's not a good thing to have on your driver's license."

Building a defense for those cited Wednesday may not be easy, Trayner said. If the trooper saw the accident, that's more difficult to defend against. If not, witnesses would be needed.

Trayner said a lawyer would have to find out whether the driver was careless "or was just trying to get the hell out of that mess."

Reporter Billy Townsend contributed to this report. Reporter Keith Morelli can be reached at kmorelli@tampatrib.com or (813) 259-7760.

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