Published September 11, 2008 10:42 pm - Michael Andrew Schultheis, 33, Cannelburg, was sentenced to 13 years in the Department of Corrections on Sept. 4 for charges related to a personal injury accident on Oct. 26, 2006.
Driver sentenced to 13 years for personal injury accident
From Staff Reports
Michael Andrew Schultheis, 33, Cannelburg, was sentenced to 13 years in the Department of Corrections on Sept. 4 for charges related to a personal injury accident on Oct. 26, 2006.
Schultheis pled guilty on March 4 to operating a vehicle with a Schedule I or II controlled substance in the body causing serious injury, a Class C felony, and being a habitual traffic violator, a Class D felony. Daviess Superior Court Judge Dean Sobecki said Schultheis will spend seven years in prison with a year of home detention and six years of probation.
According to the probable cause affidavit, state police Trooper Gaven Wilson came upon a personal injury accident on CRs 650E and 100S. When he arrived, several men were standing in a cornfield over a man who had been ejected from a truck. The man, Andrew Hurst, suffered a broken right ankle, broken left clavicle, severed ear and a possible broken neck, along with other lacerations and contusions and possible internal injuries.
A deputy from the Daviess County Sheriff’s Department interviewed a witness, Galen Graber, who said he was behind Schultheis. While he was slowing down at the intersection of 650E and 100S, he did not stop. Schultheis entered the intersection and swerved but was unable to avoid the collision.
In an interview at the scene, Schultheis said he was heading north and did not see the other truck, then swerved. Schultheis, due to a prior DUI conviction in 2004, was already a habitual traffic violator and was arrested. He passed a field sobriety test but failed a chemical test for amphetamines at Daviess Community Hospital.
After a search of Schultheis’ truck, a trooper found two pen casings that contained residue of methamphetamine.
Hurst was taken to Deaconess Hospital in Evansville for a broken right ankle, broken left shoulder blade, severed ear, a possible broken neck and other possible internal injuries.
Schultheis was represented by Michael D. Chestnut and the state by Daviess County Prosecutor G. Byron Overton.