Old payphone pedestal may have saved 2 pedestrians from car rolling over them

MILWAUKEE (WISN) - A relic of a bygone era may have saved the lives of two people walking on the sidewalk in Milwaukee when a car involved in a crash suddenly rolled over them.

Dramatic surveillance video shows the two-car crash Saturday evening. A dark SUV is seen turning into the path of a speeding white car. The white car then slides into two people, a man and a woman, on the sidewalk nearby, rolling right over them.

Remarkably, no one was seriously hurt. Police say four people were taken to the hospital, all with non-life-threatening injuries.

A witness named Nery, who didn’t want her last name used, says she was at a kid’s birthday party next door, and everyone came rushing out to help after hearing the crash.

“All of us were eating, and suddenly, I heard a sound like a brake. Then, we heard a hit, and all of us left the party. We went to see, and there was the car,” said Nery through a translator.

Slowing the video down, it appears an old payphone pedestal may have moved the sliding car in just such a way as to help spare the pedestrians its full force.

“Yes, they are fine. They had a few scratches, scraped their knees and elbows. But they are fine, thank God,” said Nery through a translator.

In the video, the female pedestrian can be seen getting up and going to the back of the car to help the man, who is still on the ground. As she does so, passengers in the car can be seen crawling out the back window.

“The guy was having a hard time breathing. The girl was crying. She said her shoulder got messed up. She had scratches on her. They were sitting on the ground, crying,” witness Cha Song said.

Song wants a stoplight placed at the intersection to try to slow traffic, saying crashes there are all too common.

“I thought for sure they were killed. But I’m really happy that they’re doing good, they’re OK,” he said. “It was really scary for me.”

The driver of the car was ticketed for reckless driving, driving with a suspended license and driving without insurance.