Charges filed against wrong-way driver in fatal head-on crash
A man with four prior DUI arrests has been charged in another accident which killed one person and injured three others over the Thanksgiving weekend.
Jonathan Lozoya Caldera, 29, of Arvada, is himself still recovering from extensive injuries suffered in the head-on collision.
That didn't stop the 1st Judicial District Attorney's Office, which didn't wait for Caldera's release from the hospital and subsequent booking into jail, as is normal procedure.
Caldera likely won't be out of the hospital for some time, a spokesperson with the Wheat Ridge Police Department told CBS4.
It was Wheat Ridge PD's officers who responded around midnight Nov. 26 to the eastbound lanes of Interstate 70 near the Kipling Avenue exit. They "found a chaotic scene," as stated in the department's press release later that day, and quickly shut down the interstate.
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WRPD's investigation determined Caldera drove against traffic in his black pickup against the flow of traffic and struck an Iowa family's red truck head-on. The driver of that truck, 53-year-old Alejandro Sanchez Garcia of West Liberty, Iowa, was killed. Garcia's three passengers and Caldera were all hospitalized with serious injuries.
WRPD announced Friday that Caldera has been charged with vehicular homicide, three counts of vehicular assault, drug possession with intent to distribute, driving while his license was under restraint, and a traffic violation.
A search of online court records shows four previous Driving Under the Influence arrests in Caldera's criminal history - 2012 in Logan County, 2013 in Westminster, 2017 in Adams County, and 2021 in Arvada.
He did not serve a jail sentence in any of those cases.
