A Decatur police officer is back on the job following a Saturday-afternoon wreck on Beltline Road Southwest that sent him to the hospital, a police official said.
While a crash report appeared to attribute blame for the 5:23 p.m., two-vehicle collision to officer Brian Walter Prosser, 26, of Somerville, for failing to yield as he turned onto Old Moulton Road, police said they are conducting further investigation.
The report said witnesses told officers the traffic signal's left turn arrow was yellow when Prosser, northbound on Beltline Road, made the left turn in front of a southbound pickup, but it did not state whether an oncoming pickup had a red or green light.
"We're looking into that," police spokesman Lt. John Crouch said.
Witnesses told The Daily that the officer did not have a turn signal and it appeared the pickup had the right of way.
Justin Gillespie said he was behind the patrol car in the turn lane and saw that signals for traffic heading straight were turning yellow.
"(Prosser) hesitated and then went ahead and went," Gillespie said.
Gillespie said it wasn't raining or foggy at the time.
The pickup struck the passenger side of Prosser's patrol car, causing the 2007 Ford Crown Victoria to spin around and hit the pickup's rear bumper and come to rest in the median on the south side of the intersection, the report said.
The pickup came to rest off the roadway. Driver Freddie Scott Nesbitt, 39, of Muscle Shoals, and his passengers were not injured, according to the report.
Gillespie said Prosser stayed in his car until the ambulance arrived.
"What really made me mad about that was every cop that arrived on scene didn't go over there and check on the truck -- they went over and checked on the police car," he said.
The ambulance took Prosser to Decatur Morgan Hospital emergency room. He was treated and released, a hospital spokeswoman said.
Crouch said Prosser returned to work this week.
"He's good," Crouch said. The patrol car, he said, "It's totaled."
Copyright 2013 - The Decatur Daily, Ala.
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
