Crash victim gets second chance at life

Woman, 53, suffered multiple serious injuries

A Sunrise hit-and-run victim who sustained injuries so severe that her chances of survival seemed slim is making a recovery. A 21-year-old has turned himself in to face charges. He is also named in a civil lawsuit.

The injuries sustained by Michelle Holguin when she was struck by a hitand-run driver in Sunrise as she bicycled home from her job as a waitress were massive.

Trauma specialists told police Holguin had a brain bleed, cracked ribs, a broken right leg and a laceration to her head. Placed in a medically induced coma, her chances of survival seemed slim.

But Holguin, 53, did survive that July 15 collision and has left Broward Health North in Deerfield Beach to begin outpatient therapy to regain mobility and speech and to overcome memory loss.

“It’s rough. It’s really rough dealing with it,” Holguin told reporters in a recent interview. “I hope it never happens to anybody else.”

Nearly a month after the collision on West Sunrise Boulevard, Adrian Perez, a 21-year-old Davie resident, turned himself in to face charges of fleeing the scene of the crash and tampering with evidence.

Perez is free on $52,500 bond.

Perez also has been named in a civil lawsuit alleging he negligently drove his car in a “dangerous and unreasonable manner” before the collision. The lawsuit, filed in Broward circuit court by attorneys representing Holguin, seeks damages in excess of $15,000.

“It hurts that he didn’t say ‘I’m sorry,’ ” Holguin said. “I don’t know why he did it.”

Kenneth Padowitz, an attorney representing Perez in the criminal case, said, “Obviously this is a terrible situation. I know my client feels terrible about what has occurred to Michelle.”

The criminal charges against Perez were filed Aug 10 after a four-week investigation in which Sunrise police detectives used surveillance video, cellphone records, photos from Sunpass toll plazas and witness interviews to build a case against a suspect police said attempted to cover up his involvement in the crash.

Minutes after striking Holguin from behind in an eastbound lane, Perez stopped to survey the damage to his 2016 Nissan and then texted a friend, “Yo I hit a deer wtf,” police said.

In a second text a minute later, Perez said, “I’M OK BUT THE DEER DIED.”

That night Perez also used his cellphone to search the internet for the cost of fixing a windshield and for news on hit-run crashes, according to an arrest affidavit.

The investigative timeline that led to Perez turning himself in Aug. 11 to face criminal charges began July 26 when police obtained a surveillance video from the Mobil gas station at 12580 W. Sunrise Blvd., a block from the crash scene. In that video, recorded minutes after the crash, Perez is seen inspecting damage to his car’s passenger side hood and the windshield, which is smashed.

On Aug. 4 Perez told police he had hired an attorney and declined to give a statement.

On Aug. 8 police contacted Perez at Jungle Queen Riverboats, where he worked, and served a search warrant to seize his cellphone The following day detectives also contacted the friend whom Perez had texted after Holguin was hit.

That friend, Brandon Hernandez, quoted Perez as saying “he was in big trouble and was going away for life,” according to the affidavit.

Holguin