Earlier this week, the Ohio State Police cited an elderly woman from Youngstown for allegedly causing a three car pile-up earlier in the month that involved an Ohio State Police Patrolwoman's cruiser and another vehicle.

The 85-year-old woman from Youngstown, OH has been cited for her failure to yield to a public safety vehicle. She is accused of pulling into the intersection of U.S. Route 224 and Market Street as the patrolwoman was speeding through it to service a dispatch. The 85-year-old woman had a green light, but failed to recognize the flashing lights and blaring siren. 

When the crash happened, the state trooper was actually responding to another accident that had taken place moments before at the intersection of Route 224 and South Ave. Police and witnesses say that the lights and sirens of the cruiser were indeed activated, but that the woman in question did not heed the warning and was subsequently "t-boned" by the patrolwoman. The impact of the two vehicles caused a third vehicle to be hit. Each vehicle contained only a driver and the three of them were taken to St. Elizabeth Health Center in Boardman, Ohio with what were said to be minor injuries.

The general consensus is that the woman became confused when she heard the sirens and was attempting to pull to the side after her light had turned green, but actually pulled directly into the path of the oncoming police cruiser. While the law is pretty clear about yielding to official vehicles regardless of traffic signals, locals are concerned because this is the second time a member of some police unit has struck a civilian vehicle while attending to a dispatch at a busy intersection in the past month.

Source: WKBN News, "Woman cited in OSP crash" 15 October 2013