SALT LAKE CITY (ABC 4 News) - Utah Highway Patrol trooper arrested Monday a suspect in a fatal hit-and-run accident on I-215.
20-year-old Brayden Beddoes was killed Sunday night while working in a construction zone on I-215 near 33rd South in West Valley. Troopers say a pick-up truck veered into the construction zone hitting both a cement barrier and Brayden Beddoes.
Initially Trooper Jeff Nigbur admitted that they had "little to go on." But that all changed Monday when a driver called them saying he'd witnesses the accident. "He actually followed the suspect off an off-ramp and back onto an on-ramp and gave us the plate information," said Trooper Nigbur.
Using the license plate number investigators first tracked down a home address in Salt Lake County and then got a cell number for the driver of the pick-up truck who was working in Roosevelt, Utah.
While a patrol lieutenant looked for the pick up and driver in Roosevelt, investigators in Salt Lake talked to him on the phone. Nigbur relates, "He did admit to being in that particular location at that time of night - in the construction area - and had hit something. He didn't mention anything about what that might be."
While he did talk to them, Nigbur described the driver as "uncooperative" so the decision was made to have the lieutenant put him in handcuffs and bring him back to Salt Lake, rather than allow him to turn himself in.
Monday night, 49-year old Michael Todd Brinkman was booked into the Salt Lake County Jail on the charge of leaving the scene of an injury accident. That charge is a class A misdemeanor. But a UHP spokesman said other charges are also being considered.
Formal charges will not be filed until after the Salt Lake County District Attorney has a chance to review the case against Brinkman.
Nigbur praised the tipster who provided the key to finding Brinkman. "Without that we really had very little to go on. So his tip was a big deal for us. And obviously with a fatality involved and a family mourning right now hopefully we can bring some kind of closure to them."
