Woman charged with misdemeanor manslaughter

OAKLAND >> A 56-year-old woman has been charged with three misdemeanors in connection with a December 2020 crash that killed a 43-year-old man and injured four others, court records show.

Mattie Flowers was charged this week with vehicular manslaughter, driving on a suspended license and possessing a “drug ingestion device” — a glass pipe — court records show. Crash investigators determined Flowers initiated the crash that killed Dharmendra Kumar Bhatti by making an illegal right turn in a double-left lane at speeds between 30 and 50 miles per hour, according to police. A GoFundMe page for Bhatti’s funeral costs describes him as “a great guy who never stopped helping anyone” and that he “meant the world to our family.” He worked as a custodian for more than two decades, according to his online obituary.

The charging records say that after the crash, two children in Bhatti’s car were hospitalized with serious injuries, along with Flowers and her passenger. At the hospital, police wrote up a search warrant for Flowers’ blood, later writing in court records they believed she was under the influence of a stimulant.

“She spoke very fast and rambled when asked questions, spoke very incoherently, continuously moved about, even though she had severe pain from a broken hip and her hands continuously moved while talking,” Hayward police Det. Rodney Johnson wrote in court records.

Police directed a phlebotomist to draw Flowers’ blood for testing, then watched as the phlebotomist spent the next 25 minutes poking her with needles, without success. The cops called off the attempts “due to the pain Flowers seemed to be going through,” then discovered Flowers’ blood and urine had been collected when she was admitted to the hospital. It tested positive for cocaine and showed signs of metabolized THC, indicating not-recent marijuana use, police said in court records.

The “drug ingestion device” charge stems from Flowers allegedly having “a glass pipe used to smoke illegal drugs, such as cocaine,” police said in court records.

Flowers is not in custody at Alameda County jail, according to the Santa Rita Jail’s registry. She had her first court appearance this week but did not enter a plea, according to court records.