BUFFALO (WBEN) - A Rochester teen has pleaded guilty to charges stemming from an attempted traffic stop that led to serious injuries to a Buffalo Police officer in Cheektowaga back in June.
The 16-year-old male from Rochester pleaded guilty Wednesday to one count of assault on a police officer and one count of unlawful fleeing a police officer in a motor vehicle.
Back on June 3, Officer Jonathan Negron, who has two years on the force, was trying to stop the vehicle when that vehicle crashed into a pole on Harlem Road in Cheektowaga, and the pole came down on the officer's car.
After the collision, police say the unnamed teen and three others ran from the vehicle, but were quickly apprehended and taken into custody. The driver is the only person who has been charged in this incident.
"Obviously, the defendant here didn't purposefully intend to cut down the utility pole to fall down on top of the police care, but legally it doesn't matter," said Flynn. "If your actions caused something to happen, and that something that happened causes injury to a police officer, that's all you legally need."
Negron was put into a medically induced coma following the incident, and he spent more than a month in the hospital with serious head and spinal injuries.
"There was no plea that was going to be offered; I wasn't going to reduce it at all," said Flynn. "He had two choices: either plead guilty to the charges or go to trial. That was conveyed from day-one to the defense attorney and to the defendant, and when they realized they weren't going to be able to get a plea out of me, they just said, 'Okay, we'll plead to the charges.'"
The adolescent offender remains held in the Erie County Youth Service Center. He faces a maximum of 15 years in prison when he is sentenced on Thursday, October 28, 2021 at 2:00 p.m.
