Driver arrested, accused of hitting and injuring 2 St. George IRONMAN participants

David DeMille, St. George Spectrum & Daily News
·1 min read
Participants in the St. George IRONMAN triathlon race. Two participants in the race on Saturday were injured when a driver allegedly ignored a traffic flagger and drove onto the race course.
Participants in the St. George IRONMAN triathlon race. Two participants in the race on Saturday were injured when a driver allegedly ignored a traffic flagger and drove onto the race course.

A 68-year-old Utah woman was arrested over the weekend and charged with a felony after allegedly driving onto the race course during Saturday's IRONMAN triathlon in St. George and causing two cyclists to crash.

Both cyclists were injured by the collision, including one who had a visible compound arm fracture, and were transported to St. George Regional Hospital for treatment, according to arresting documents filed in 5th District Court.

The accident was reported just before 11 a.m. near the intersection of Telegraph Street and Slow Creek Lane, just as thousands of IRONMAN participants were making their way through city streets blocked off by barricades, cones and traffic flaggers.

The suspect, Diana Marie Linford of Farr West, Utah, was charged with two felony counts of causing an injury through negligent driving and one misdemeanor traffic violation related to her ignoring a flagger who tried to keep her from driving onto the roadway, according to the report.

The arresting officer, a member of the St. George Police Department, said in the report that Linford admitted to having smoked marijuana earlier that morning and that she was admitted to having illegal narcotics inside the car at the time of the accident.

"After the evaluation done by two separate (Drug Recognition Experts), (Linford) was found to be under the influence of illegal narcotics," according to the report.

Linford was booked into Purgatory Correctional Facility in Hurricane on $10,000 bail.

Editor's note: An earlier version of this story misidentified the name of the street on which the accident occurred. The accident took place near the intersection of Telegraph and Slow Creek Lane.

David DeMille writes about southwestern Utah for The Spectrum & Daily News, a USA TODAY Network newsroom based in St. George. Follow him at @SpectrumDeMille or contact him at ddemille@thespectrum.com. To support and sustain this work, please subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on St. George Spectrum & Daily News: Utah IRONMAN crash injures 2 after driver steers onto course