Driver, 20, arrested in DUII crash NE of Redmond

A 20-year-old Redmond man who reportedly swerved to miss a deer lost control of his SUV, which sheared off a power pole near Terrebonne early Sunday. He later was arrested on DUII, reckless driving and other charges, Deschutes County sheriff’s deputies said.

Central Electric Cooperative reported the crash did not cut power to the area, but repair crews’ work to replace the pole required an outage that cut power to nearly 450 members for about 3 hours.

Nicholas Burns was heading west on O’Neil Way in a green 1997 Ford Explorer around 4:45 a.m. when he said he swerved to miss a deer, lost control and left the road, shearing off a power pole, said sheriff’s Sgt. Vance Lawrence.

A passer-by called after seeing the SUV off the road around 6:10 a.m., Lawrence said. Burns had left the scene for a time but returned while deputies were investigating the crash.

Burns was arrested on three Class A misdemeanors – DUII, reckless driving and recklessly endangering another person, his passenger, and also was cited for being a minor in possession of alcohol, Lawrence said. He was lodged at the county jail in Bend but later released to a responsible third party, a jail officer said.

Central Electric Co-Op officials said the crash northeast of Redmond required emergency repairs and turning off power to 437 CEC accounts from 9 a.m. until reports were complete around 12:30 p.m.

Normally, CEC crews dig a hole for a replacement pole before turning off power to transition to the new pole, a relatively faster process. But they said this pole’s location, about a mile east of a CEC substation, and its support of lines from several directions, required the longer outage, for speed and safety reasons.

It was at least the third DUII crash resulting in an arrest in Deschutes County this weekend, and the second involving an alleged underage drinker. The first was a crash on Highway 97 at Hwy. 126/Evergreen Avenue Saturday morning that caused one critical injury and led to the arrest of a 19-year-old Warm Springs woman.

Also, a crash on Archie Briggs Road in northwest Bend just after midnight Sunday led to the arrest and jailing of that driver as well, police said. Further details were unavailable.