Portland , OR :Man recounts similar collision with driver blamed for deadly crash on Sarurday , June 23rd 2015

Shawn Kelly isn't just shocked by the images from Saturday's crash that killed four people, including two young boys on Highway 14 in Skamania County.Kelly isn't shocked, necessarily, at the debris scattered along the road from the crossover crash and head-on collision.Kelly is shocked that Heath Martin, the man behind the wheel of the pickup that crossed the centerline, and who was among those killed in the crash, is the same driver who did the very same thing to him just three years ago.“The accident that we were involved in ... it was pretty devastating and that should have been a good lesson for him,” says Kelly.Not much was left of Heath Martin's car after the head-on crash. Fire crews had to cut the top off to get him out.Kelly was working as an elevator mechanic and was on his way down Marine Drive near Leadbetter Road in North Portland at 1:30 p.m. on July 9, 2012, when Martin's car crossed the road's centerline and slammed into his truck.“I didn't even actually see this guy cross the divider and hit me,” Kelly says. “I was just driving along and then all of a sudden I came to, sitting in a pile of rubble.”Kelly never knew why Martin swerved into him that day.Martin never contacted him, never even said he was sorry.Kelly can't understand why Martin was on the road at all Saturday without a valid driver's license, according to Washington's Department of Licensing.Kelly believes every driver has to be careful, especially on two lane roads with no protection from oncoming cars.“Everybody has to realize they're driving a big, heavy vehicle that, in a second's notice, can kill someone or themselves,” says Kelly.Kelly says he never had time to react to Martin's car crossing the centerline.


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Man recounts similar collision with driver blamed for deadly crash