DUI Crash That Injured Juvenile Ends With Montco Driver's Guilty Plea

LOWER PROVIDENCE, PA — A local man has pleaded guilty to criminal charges in connection with a single-vehicle crash in the spring of 2021 that left his juvenile female passenger with serious injuries that necessitated air transport to a hospital, according to court records and media reports.

Jordan Anthony Sims, 24, of Lower Providence Township, entered guilty pleas on Nov. 29 before Montgomery County Common Pleas Court Judge Wendy Rothstein to one felony count of accidents involving injury while not licensed and one misdemeanor charge of driving under the influence of a controlled substance.

The criminal docket sheet in the case shows that other felony and misdemeanor counts stemming from the serious vehicle accident were dismissed in exchange for the guilty pleas on the two counts.

Sentencing has not yet been scheduled and will take place once a background investigation is complete.

An article in the Mercury newspaper states that the criminal charges stemmed from an early morning accident on March 28, 2021, along the 700 block of Main Street in the Harleysville section of Lower Salford Township, when officers were sent out to a report of a vehicle crashing into a telephone pole.

Police encountered the juvenile female passenger partially hanging in the roadway and partially hanging out of the vehicle's passenger side, the report says, and that Sims was tending to the girl at the time of the crash.

Sims crashed so hard that the body of the tow truck he was driving separated from the towing boom mechanism and support platform, the story says.

Both Sims and the juvenile had to be airlifted to Philadelphia area hospitals for treatment of serious injuries, with the girl reportedly sustaining a brain injury, liver damage, a fractured pelvis and two broken legs, according to the Mercury.

Evidence of alcohol consumption and drug use were reportedly discovered by investigators at the scene, and officers found out that Sims did not have a valid driver's license at the time of the crash.

Toxicology tests subsequently found traces of illegal drugs in Sims's bloodstream, according to the article.

The court docket in the case shows that Sims entered what is known as an 'open guilty plea' on the two counts, meaning his sentencing will be at the sole discretion of Judge Rothstein and not subject to any deals with prosecutors.

Court records show that Sims remains free on bail while awaiting sentencing.

A more serious second-degree felony charge of aggravated assault by vehicle while driving under the influence was one of the counts that was dismissed in exchange for Sims's guilty plea.