Police: DUI suspect ran into woods near Brookfield Zoo after four-car crash

SHARE Police: DUI suspect ran into woods near Brookfield Zoo after four-car crash
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Eduardo Reyes-Hurtado | Riverside police

A man has been charged with DUI after he ran off shirtless into the woods near Brookfield Zoo following a four-vehicle crash Wednesday morning in west suburban Riverside, according to police.

Authorities were called about the crash at First Avenue and Ridgewood Road in Riverside at 11:16 a.m., according to a statement from Riverside police.

The first responding officer found four vehicles in the intersection and several injured people, police said.

Witnesses told the officer the man who caused the crash had run away northbound  into Zoo Woods, across from Brookfield Zoo. They described him as wearing blue jeans and a blue T-shirt.

While searching the area, officers found the blue T-shirt, discarded by the man in an attempt to make himself harder to identify, police said. They eventually found 23-year-old Eduardo Reyes-Hurtado running along the Des Plaines River and were able to subdue him after a foot chase and struggle.

Reyes-Hurtado was taken back to the accident scene, where witnesses identified him as the person who got out of a vehicle and ran off after causing the crash, police said. Officers detected the scent of alcohol on his breath and noticed his eyes were red and glassy.

He was taken to Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, where he was treated for minor injuries suffered in the crash, then  placed under arrest for DUI, police said. Officers requested the hospital draw blood and urine for testing.

A 25-year-old Berwyn woman was also taken to Loyola with non-life-threatening injuries, police said. Several other motorists were treated by paramedics at the scene.

Investigators discovered Reyes-Hurtado’s driver’s license had been suspended because of a November 2014 DUI conviction in Chicago, police said.

He told them he drank beer before the accident and had been involved in a separate hit-and-run at Harlem and Ogden in Riverside earlier that morning, where he crashed his car into a parked vehicle in a parking lot, police said.

Reyes-Hurtado, of the 1300 block of Parkside Road, was charged with leaving the scene of an accident, driving with a revoked license and driving without insurance for the initial hit-and-run at Harlem and Ogden, police said.

He was charged with felony counts of DUI and leaving the scene of an accident with injuries for the crash at First and Ridgewood, in addition to driving with a revoked license, driving with open alcohol in the car, driving without insurance and failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident, police said. He was also charged with resisting a police officer for the fight that occurred when he was arrested in the woods.

His criminal history includes 19 prior traffic arrests, according to police. At the time of his arrest, he was on a two-year probation for the Chicago DUI arrest that got his license revoked. He is being held without bond.

Police investigate the scene of a crash Wednesday morning in Riverside. | Riverside police

Open beer cans were found inside a car after a crash Wednesday morning in Riverside. | Riverside police


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