Toddler breaks collarbone in suspected DUI crash

A 3-year-old girl broke her collarbone because she was sitting on the front-seat floorboard of a car — rather than buckled into a car seat —when a suspected drunken driver crashed the vehicle, according to the Washington State Patrol.

The driver, 28-year-old Zachary Baker of Bonney Lake, pleaded not guilty this week to two counts of vehicular assault, reckless endangerment, driving on a suspended license and failure to have an ignition interlock device installed. Bail was set at $500,000.

Troopers said Baker acknowledged that his license was suspended and that he didn’t have an interlock device on his car as required.

The accident happened about 8 p.m. Saturday at Portland Avenue and a state Route 512 off-ramp.

Baker was behind the wheel of a Toyota Camry carrying four adults and three children, ages 1, 3 and 9, according to charging papers, which noted that the vehicle safely seats five.

Witnesses said Baker made a left turn into a pickup truck that had a green light.

“The defendant explained that it all happened so fast that he wasn’t aware that he needed to yield to the pickup,” court records show.

The mother of the children, who police said was drunk, suffered a dislocated hip in the collision. She said she was asleep at the time of the crash and thought her 9-year-old had put the 1-year-old in a car seat in the back seat, records show.

Neither she nor Baker could explain why the 3-year-old was unbuckled and sitting on the floorboard.

Child Protective Services took custody of the children.

Prosecutors said they might file additional charges against Baker depending on whether the pickup driver was hurt.

This story was originally published September 15, 2015 at 11:01 AM with the headline "Toddler breaks collarbone in suspected DUI crash."