8 Anaheim High School running team members struck by suspected DUI driver, police say
By Abigail Velez
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ANAHEIM, Calif. (KABC) — Eight students on the Anaheim High School running team were injured after a suspected DUI driver plowed into them during a training run Wednesday afternoon, police said.
The high school students were waiting at the intersection of Harbor Boulevard and W. North Street when they were hit by a car that went off the road just before 3 p.m., according to the Anaheim Police Department.
Police said eight students, between 16 and 17 years old, were struck. Three were immediately taken to a hospital with serious injuries.
Eyewitness News obtained surveillance video from a nearby business that shows a red Toyota veer right and head toward the corner where the students were standing.
“All I could see was people running around hysterically trying to save somebody right in front of that car,” witness Eddie Martinez recalled.
The driver, only identified as a 27-year-old Anaheim man, was also taken to a hospital in unknown condition. He was later arrested on suspicion of DUI and will be booked once he’s released from the hospital.
Police said a coach was running with the students and was coming up to the intersection when he witnessed the crash.
School resource officers were on scene following the incident.
For Martinez, a parent of two student athletes attending Anaheim High, the crash feels like a bad case of déjà vu.
“It’s becoming a common thing around here,” he said.
In 2022, a wrong-way driver slammed into a group of law enforcement recruits during a morning run in Whittier, injuring 25.
Last year, a speeding driver spun out, hit a pole and struck students on a sidewalk near the Anaheim Tennis Center.
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