TAYLORSVILLE, Utah — A Taylorsville man has been formally charged in connection with a July 28 crash that claimed the life of a 2-year-old girl.
The crash occurred in the area of 5095 S 3200 W.
According to a court document, 43-year-old Michael Conder told police he was driving a Ford F-150 on 3200 W when he glanced at his cellphone "for a split second" and struck the back of a Dodge Stratus, which had stopped to avoid hitting a small dog.
The crash pushed the Stratus into the sidewalk area, where it struck a woman and her twin daughters and pushed them into a brick wall along the sidewalk. The woman and one daughter suffered serious injuries. The other girl died of blunt force injuries suffered in the crash.
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Conder consented to a blood draw, and test results showed he had a measurable amount of morphine in his system at the time of the crash.
"A review of [Conder's] prescription history revealed that on the day of the collision, [Conder] did not have an active prescription for Morphine or Codeine and 9-monoacetylmorphine, which metabolizes to Morpheine," the document states.
Data extracted from the F-150's power-train control module shows Conder was traveling at about 36 mph at the time of the crash, and his reaction to brake happened between 1 and 1.2 seconds of the collision, according to the document.
Conder is charged with a second-degree felony count of driving with a measurable controlled substance in the body and causing serious bodily injury or death in connection with the crash. He is also charged with a class C misdemeanor count of careless driving and an infraction of following too close.
