Six-car pile up sends one to hospital

A six-car collision Friday shortly before 10 p.m. snarled the already-snarled eastbound lanes of Interstate 90 construction zone and sent one passenger to the hospital. According to the Washington State Patrol, cars driven by Michael Edward Hughes, 24, of Spokane Valley, Stacey Marie Valencia, 25, of Leavenworth, Nicholas Manning Pickard, 18, of Seattle, and a Freightliner truck driven by Bradley James Bowerman, 44, of Spokane Valley, were stopped in the center lane of the construction zone near the Hamilton Street exit. Robert Lawrence Malach, 56, of Calgary, Alberta, was in the right lane, driving a Chevrolet Caprice and towing a travel trailer. Jeffrey Ryan Siemers, 32, of Spokane Valley, failed to slow down in the congestion, and hit Malach’s trailer with his Toyota pickup before smashing into Hughes’ Mazda SW, WSP said. The impact caused a chain reaction, forcing the Mazda into Valencia’s Nissan Maxima, which then hit Pickard’s Subaru Legacy, which then hit the Freightliner. Olivia Rae Brookshire, 26, of Spokane Valley, a passenger in Hughes’ car, was injured and taken to Deaconess Medical Center, where she was in stable condition this morning. Siemers was not injured, and was booked into Spokane County Jail on charges of vehicular assault. Siemers’, Hughes’ and Valencia’s cars and Malach’s trailer all were totaled in the crash. Only the Caprice and the Freightliner escaped unscathed, according to WSP. The incident forced I-90 eastbound traffic onto the shoulder as police investigated the scene. The construction zone configuration in the area was restored about 4 a.m., police said.