By Shereen Siewert
WAUSAU — A plea agreement appears to be in the works for a man accused of leaving the scene of a crash in Colby, then driving several miles and crashing again before being arrested on drunken driving and hit-and-run charges.
A plea hearing is set for Dec. 6 for Elliot S. Graves, 36, of Abbotsford in Marathon County Circuit Court. Graves faces two counts each of hit and run causing injury and OWI causing injury.
Colby/Abbotsford police were called at 6:34 p.m. Nov. 4 to the intersection of Division Street and Spence Street for a report of a hit-and-run crash where the driver of a red pickup rear-ended a vehicle stopped at a stop sign before fleeing the scene. Two passengers in the vehicle that remained at the scene were injured and were transported to a local hospital for treatment, according to police.
Five minutes later, officers were called to a single-vehicle crash on Huckleberry Road in the town of Hull, where they discovered Graves behind the wheel of a red pickup with significant front-end damage, according to the incident report. Graves, whose vehicle was in the ditch, initially told police he swerved to avoid a deer. After allegedly failing field sobriety tests Graves submitted a breath test, which indicated a blood alcohol concentration of 0.22 percent, nearly three times the legal limit for driving in Wisconsin.
Court documents show Graves was convicted twice before of drunken driving, first in 2005 and again in 2012.
Graves is free on a $2,500 cash bond. He faces up to 12 years in prison if he is convicted on all counts.
