Cartersville man jailed after serious-injury crash

Police say the wreck knocked out power to the area in South Rome, and two passengers sustained head injuries.

Police say the wreck knocked out power to the area in South Rome, and two passengers sustained head injuries.

A Cartersville man was in jail without bond Sunday, accused of driving drunk on South Broad Street and getting into a wreck that seriously injured two people.

According to Floyd County Jail and Rome Police Department reports:

Harkirat Singh, 25, of 29 Colonial Court in Cartersville, didn’t even realize two of his passengers were lying on the pavement with bloody heads until police pointed it out to him. He was “only concerned with the state of his vehicle.”

The incident started early Saturday when an officer saw Singh’s 2012 Audi squeal out of the parking lot behind Mellow Mushroom and speed up to East Second Avenue and then Broad Street. The officer activated his blue lights but Singh continued to accelerate, and crossed the bridge onto South Broad Street.

Singh was driving at least 70 mph when the officer turned on his siren and he continued to speed down the road. The officer lost sight of the Audi at Myrtle Street and slowed pursuit, but when he came to a power outage in the 400 block, he correctly assumed Singh had wrecked somewhere.

At South Broad and Lookout Circle, the officer saw the vehicle overturned in the middle of the street. It had hit a power pole, a wooden retaining wall and a concrete column.

One passenger was lying in the street, unresponsive, with a broken leg and severe head trauma. Another had crawled out, bleeding from the head, and passed out next to the first one.

Singh was seen climbing out of the driver’s side window and admitted he had been driving. All four people in the car, including Singh, had injuries that required treatment and they were taken to Floyd Medical Center.

The wreck scene was turned over to the Georgia State Patrol for investigation. Both the Rome officer and GSP trooper said there was a strong odor of alcohol coming from Singh, who was talking but appeared disoriented.

He was medically cleared at the hospital, where blood was drawn for analysis at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation Crime Lab.

Singh was booked into the jail on two felony counts of serious injury by vehicle and felony attempting to elude a police officer. He’s also facing misdemeanor charges of reckless driving, failure to maintain a lane, DUI and driving too fast for conditions.