A woman was injured in a hit-and-run crash over the weekend on Hyde Park Road, and a Santa Fe man faces a slew of criminal charges in the incident, including drunken driving and leaving the scene of an accident. Santa Fe County sheriff's deputies were dispatched to the crash around 9 a.
Saturday on N. A man who was driving into the mountains on the roadway told deputies a driver in a Nissan Armada β later identified as year-old Arneston Rene Morales Chavez of Santa Fe β came around a corner "at a high rate of speed" and veered into his lane, causing the crash, according to a statement of probable cause.
A woman in the passenger seat suffered a laceration to her face, but no other injuries were reported, the document states. Deputies allege Morales Chavez continued driving after the crash until his vehicle came to a stop farther down the road, and then he and at least one other passenger abandoned the vehicle and ran off. Morales Chavez faces nine criminal charges, including aggravated driving while intoxicated, knowingly leaving the scene of an accident, failure to give information and render aid, possession of an open container and careless driving, according to a criminal complaint filed against him in Santa Fe County Magistrate Court.
A man at the crash scene told deputies he had been riding with the men in the Nissan after hitching a ride near Ski Santa Fe, where his vehicle broke down, according to the statement of probable cause. Deputies traced the Nissan to Morales Chavez by some paperwork and money order receipts that had fallen out of it, the statement says.
His blood-alcohol content was measured at 0. He was booked into Santa Fe County jail Saturday afternoon. The suspected perpetrator also died.
