A pair of 21-year-old Herndon residents are lucky to be alive after a drunk driver rear-ended the car that they were driving during the early morning hours of July 9, police said.
Shortly after 12:30 a.m., Wednesday morning, 48-year-old Philip Perri of Arlington, driving a 1989 BMW ran into Oakton High School graduates Zachary Stinson and Carl Pharpi while they sat stopped at a red light on Sully Road (Route 28), according to police.
Perri plowed into the 2003 Honda, driven by Pharpi, sending it 228 feet into the intersection of Sully and Waxpool roads. Perri then fled the scene of the accident heading south on Route 28, police said. Both victims were wearing their seat belts.
Moments after the accident, Loudoun County Sheriff’s Deputy Beverly Tate was on routine patrol when she noticed Perri’s BMW, with smoke coming from the hood, traveling south on Route 28 near Old Ox Road.
After stopping the vehicle, Tate realized that the vehicle was recently involved in a hit-and-run accident. The officer also determined that Perri was under the influence of alcohol.
Tate arrested the Arlington resident and took him to the Loudoun Adult Detention Center where he was released on $10,000 bond later that same day. On July 10, Perri was arraigned on charges of driving under the influence and felony hit and run.
"I hope that the driver doesn’t get to do it to anyone else," said Christine Stinson, Zachary’s mother.
STINSON WAS AIRLIFTED to Inova Fairfax Hospital and placed in intensive care where he was listed in critical condition. Pharpi was transported from the scene to Loudoun Hospital where he was treated and released, authorities said.
Stinson, who will be a senior at the University of Kansas in the fall, is recovering from a skull fracture and a concussion at his Oak Hill home. Doctors say Stinson, an avid snow boarder, has six-months of recovery ahead of him.
"Zach is doing very, very well considering he was choppered into the Fairfax County Trauma Unit where they had him listed as critical," his father, Jeffrey Stinson, said, shortly after Zachary was released.
"We are just so thankful to everyone," Christine Stinson said. "Given the severity of the accident, I continue to marvel at [the outcome]. After the accident, everything that could go right for Zach, did go right, from the Sterling emergency rescue squad to the police that stopped the car that hit them to the care he got at Fairfax."