Auto Rolls Over on Moeser – Occupants Escape Injury, Flee

El Cerrito resident Peter Johnson was at home about 1 a.m. when he heard the screech of tires and metal crunching on nearby Moeser Lane.

"I heard the sound of a short screech and a few crunches – crunch, crunch, crunch," he said, guessing immediately that a car had flipped and starting rolling on the steep part of Moeser.

He called 911, jumped into his tennis shoes, grabbed a flashlight, steeled himself to face horrific injuries and headed to the scene.

He was the first to arrive and found not only an eerie quiet but no sign of occupants of the vehicle, a Toyota RAV 4 sitting on its roof next to a guard rail above a steep cliff across the street from the at Moeser and Sea View Drive. He could see tire tread marks up the hill about 100 or 150 feet away.

"It was surreal," he said. "There was nobody there. There wasn't even blood on the windshield."

Police arrived. They searched for injured or dead down the side of the cliff. They found nothing.

Johnson thought of the five young males he had passed on the way there, around ages 16-18, walking away from the scene. He had asked them, "Did you guys hear a rollover accident?"

"Nope," they told him – they hadn't heard a thing.

Sgt. Shawn Maples of the El Cerrito police department said it took some tracking to find the occupants. None of them was injured, he said, and alcohol was not a factor in the accident.

The driver, however, was unlicensed and underage, he said. Those in the vehicle are from Albany and Berkeley, he said.

Maples said the case will be sent to the juvenile probation office for review.