Speeding driver, ejected during crash, dies of injuries

Officials have said that both speed and intoxication led to the deadly Sunday morning accident …

Portland Police Bureau East Precinct District officers close off SE Powell Boulevard, in the Foster-Powell neighborhood.

Story and photos by David F. Ashton

A maroon 1995 Nissan Altima was speeding eastbound on SE Powell Boulevard on September 6 at 6:50 a.m., when it smashed into a tree in the median near SE 78th Avenue.

A Portland Police Bureau (PPB) Traffic Division sergeant at the scene said the vehicle appeared to have been driving “at a high rate of speed” when the driver’s side tires “climbed the curb” three times before spinning out, jumping the median curb, and colliding with a tree.

Officers and investigators stand near the tree where the single-car crash occurred.

The driver, later identified as 23-year-old Jane Taylor Robson, was ejected from the car in the crash, suffering life-threatening injuries. Robson was entered into the Citywide Trauma System as she was rushed to a Portland hospital.

“I don’t see how she can live after being thrown out of a car like that,” said Liên Nguy?n, who said she’d been waiting for a bus when the crash occurred.

“I was looking the other way, and I heard the tires make noise, and then ‘bang!’ – so loud,” Nguy?n told East Portland News. “I looked, and there it was,” she added.

A wrecker removes the badly smashed Nissan Altima.

Two days later, PPB Public Information Officer Sgt. Pete Simpson confirmed that Robson remained in critical condition. “Investigators believe that alcohol was a contributing factor in the crash,” he said.

PPB Traffic Division sergeants continue their investigation; the tree is to the right, behind them.

Then, on September 9, Simpson followed up saying, “Early this morning, officers were notified that Jane Taylor Robson died at a Portland hospital as a result of the injuries she suffered in Sunday’s crash.”

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