State police arrest man who injured 3 in crash at DWI checkpoint in Thoreau
May 22—A Bloomfield man faces a string of charges following a drunken-driving crash Friday evening at a sobriety checkpoint in the small Western New Mexico community of Thoreau that disfigured a woman and injured a New Mexico State Police officer.
State police said in a news release Monday Joshua Floehr, 35, was driving a 2019 Mitsubishi SUV westbound on N.M. 122 at a high rate of speed when he ran over several traffic cones, blew through the checkpoint at N.M. 371 and struck an officer's patrol unit, pushing it into another officer's vehicle.
A state police officer and two women from Thoreau, ages 34 and 49, were injured in the crash, according to a police report.
The impact with the police vehicles catapulted Floehr's SUV toward the state police officer and the two women, as well as a nearby GMC Yukon, the report said. When Floehr's vehicle landed, it collided with the left rear corner of the Yukon, crushing the officer and one of the women against the Yukon.
The officer sustained injuries to his leg and chest area, and the woman's arm was "partially severed," the report said.
The officer had attempted to push the woman out of the way to prevent her from being hit, state police said in the news release.
The officer and the women were taken to an area hospital, where the officer was treated for injuries and released later that same night. The second woman did not sustain "major injuries," the police report said.
Floehr had crawled out of the passenger side of his vehicle and complained of leg pain while slurring his speech, according to the report by state Police Officer Everson Cruz, who arrested Floehr.
Although Floehr initially consented to having his blood drawn for a blood-alcohol level test, Cruz wrote he was advised he "could not get a blood draw with the Defendant's consent because of his intoxicated state" after the two arrived at the Gallup Indian Medical Center.
The officer secured a warrant for the blood draw instead, and two samples were taken before midnight, about five hours after the crash.
Cruz's report describes Floehr's uncooperative behavior with medical staff, including writing "profane phrases" on intake forms.
Before Cruz was able to handcuff Floehr to his hospital bed, he wrote, the two struggled, with Floehr grabbing at the officer's hands and handcuffs.
As they had walked into the hospital, Cruz wrote, "Mr. Floehr made a statement that caught my attention ... "I'm not a man who, uhh, quite enjoys Police, but I know when it's necessary."
After he was treated, Floehr was booked in the McKinley County jail on charges of DWI resulting in great bodily harm by a vehicle, a first-offense DWI, aggravated battery on a peace officer with a deadly weapon, aggravated assault on a peace officer with a deadly weapon, failing to stay in his lane of traffic and failure to obey a traffic control device.
The crash remains under investigation.
