WICHITA, KAN. (AP) — A jury has acquitted a former Wichita police officer who was fired for crashing his vehicle into another while speeding at nearly 80 mph without lights or sirens.
Samuel Dugo was found not guilty Friday of aggravated battery that recklessly caused bodily injury, the Wichita Eagle reported. Dugo had been charged with the felony after the March 2018 wreck critically injured a 71-year-old man. Dugo was later fired in August 2019. He had faced several years in prison if he had been convicted.
The Kansas Highway Patrol determined Dugo responding to a burglary call and driving 79 mph in a 30 mph zone when he slammed into a pickup truck. The collision threw Donald Clark through the windshield of his truck, leaving him with a broken neck, shoulder and ribs and a brain injury. Investigators say he was not using his emergency lights or sirens. Before the collision, Dugo was clocked at 100 mph.
Dugo's attorney, Jess Hoeme, said his client was so relieved by the acquittal that “his knees buckled.”