ISLAMORADA, Fla. – Florida Highway Patrol troopers jailed a woman on several drunken driving charges after authorities say she hit a Monroe County deputy’s cruiser at full speed while he was on a traffic stop along the Overseas Highway, sending him to the hospital with serious injuries.
According to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office, the crash happened at around 10:30 Tuesday night near mile marker 87 in Islamorada.
State troopers booked Alexandra Baraga, 26, of Shoreview, Minnesota, into the Plantation Key jail facility just before 11:45 p.m., according to jail records. She was later taken to MCSO’s Key West jail facility.
Authorities said she had a blood alcohol content of .310% at the time of the crash, nearly four times the legal limit of .08%.
According to MCSO, Baraga struck the deputy’s cruiser as he was walking to the back of his patrol car in the process of arresting a suspect; the cruiser lurched forward and pinned him between his car and the suspect vehicle.
The 26-year-old deputy, whose name hasn’t been released, suffered serious lower extremity injuries and was airlifted to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center in Miami for treatment. Several Keys deputies were seen gathered at the hospital Wednesday morning.
The man the deputy stopped, Andrew James Gibson, 20, of Homestead, was taken to Mariners Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, MCSO spokesperson Adam Linhardt said. He was later arrested on a warrant for failure to appear in court.
Baraga wasn’t hurt in the incident. She is facing a felony charge of DUI causing serious bodily injury, plus four misdemeanor DUI charges, according to jail records.
According to jail records, she was held on a $95,000 bond as of Wednesday afternoon. Officials scheduled an arraignment hearing for April 23.
“This a difficult day for everyone at the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office. One of our brave Deputies has been seriously injured in the line of duty because of the thoughtless actions of a drunk driver,” Monroe County Sheriff Rick Ramsay said in a news release Wednesday. “For the cost of a taxi or rideshare, she jeopardized the lives of everyone on the road.”
Linhardt said the deputy has worked for the agency since February 2022.
Local 10 News learned that he was undergoing his second surgery at JMH as of around noon Wednesday.