Northern Colorado police chief strikes, injures teen on bike, department says

A police chief in Northern Colorado struck a 15-year-old boy on a bicycle who police officials say rode into the street, injuring them, according to the Greeley Police Department.

In a statement on Tuesday, the department said Greeley Police Chief Adam Turk was driving an unmarked police car in a residential neighborhood near West 26th Street and 53rd Avenue in Greeley around 2:30 p.m. on Sunday when the teen "entered the roadway," and Turk struck them.

"Chief Turk immediately provided first aid and requested that paramedics respond to the scene," a statement from the department read, in part. "The juvenile was transported to a local hospital with non-life threatening injuries."

Greeley police initially investigated the crash, but it has since been turned over to Colorado State Patrol's vehicular crimes unit. The teen was treated and released from the hospital. 

No other details about the crash were immediately available, and the teen has not yet been identified.

Anyone who witnessed the crash or has any information about it is being asked to contact CSP.

Turk became chief of the department in 2021, according to the department. He joined the department in 1999 after working at the Evans Police Department for three years and has served as an officer, sergeant, commander, and deputy chief.

As of Tuesday, Turk was not facing any criminal charges in the crash, court records show.

Colorado State Patrol later said the cause of the crash is under investigation, but a preliminary investigation shows that the boy was riding on a non-paved multi-use trail in Josephine Jones Park when he traveled across the eastbound lane of West 26th Street and into the westbound lane, "failing to yield to traffic," when he was struck.

The teen has been released from the hospital.