Bremerton officer spots injury crash; victim later dies

BREMERTON — A 22-year-old driver whose crashed car was spotted in a ravine by a sharp-eyed Bremerton police officer has died.

Officer JD Miller says he was driving down West Belfair Valley Road on New Year’s Day, watching for abandoned cars, poachers and illegal brush pickers. He spotted fresh orange scarring on an alder tree trunk and decided to investigate. That led him to the crashed car about 20 feet down a slope.

The driver was freed by a fire rescue crew and taken to a Tacoma hospital. The Kitsap Sun reported that police say he did not survive. The man was not immediately identified.

Police think the crash went undiscovered for about nine hours.

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