Crash victim suing WPD

ANCHORAGE — A Wasilla auto accident victim is suing the Wasilla Police Department alleging that when officers chased the car that hit her, they partially caused the accident.

Jennifer Setters, 31, filed two lawsuits last month in Superior Court in Anchorage; one against her insurance company, GEICO, and the other against the city of Wasilla, its police department and former police chief John Glass, who was chief at the time of the crash.

Setters was driving her Ford Expedition from Anchorage to Wasilla shortly after 5 p.m. Aug. 11, 2006 when, just past the Knik River Bridge, a GMC pickup crossed the median and hit her head-on.

Calls had been streaming into police dispatchers that afternoon from motorists the GMC had almost driven off the road.

Wasilla police started chasing the pickup, driven by Martha Harper, at Seward-Meridian Parkway, where she almost ran over Officer Jentry Crain. Crain was on foot at the time and thought he’d managed to pull Harper over using hand signals.

The department is liable, Setters’ suit claims, because police “chased Martha Harper at high speed ... toward the most heavily populated area in the state of Alaska during rush hour traffic on a Friday afternoon in late summer when the defendants knew or should have known that there would be a continuous stream of traffic from Anchorage area northward.”

John Glass, now the acting commissioner of public safety for the state, declined to comment on the lawsuit, as did current Wasilla Police Chief Angella Long. Efforts to reach Setters were unsuccessful. As of last week, none of the defendants had filed responses to Setters’ claims.

Setters’ lawsuit against GEICO alleges the company never asked her if she wanted to purchase under-insured or uninsured motorist coverage. The other driver, Harper, was not properly insured, the lawsuit states, leaving Setters with a mountain of unpaid bills.

Indeed, of the 19 pages in the GEICO suit and the 20 pages in the WPD suit, 15 pages of each is spent detailing the various medical procedures Setters has undergone and the maladies for which she has sought treatment as a result of the accident.

According to the suit, Setters had fractured ribs and a fractured tailbone, nerve pain, vertigo, neck pain, lower back pain and other problems. She underwent surgery, was prescribed painkillers and participated in physical therapy.

Harper didn’t escape the accident uninjured either. According to prison records, Harper, 37, now resides in the Hiland Mountain Correctional Facility where she is serving a nine-year sentence, having pleaded no contest in April 2007 to two counts of assault for her actions on the road that day.

According to documents her lawyer filed asking that Harper be allowed to listen in on certain proceedings instead of traveling from prison to court, Harper suffered from a broken back and used crutches to get around.

According to documents from prosecutors in the case, Harper’s breath alcohol content four and a half hours after the crash was .203, more that twice the legal limit of .08.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.