Police seek cause of fatal I-83 accident

July 24, 2008

It will probably take weeks to determine what caused the car crash that killed a 25-year-old man and his 2-month-old son on Interstate 83 early Tuesday, a Maryland State Police spokesman said yesterday.

Ronnel S. Offer of Galesville was killed after the disabled car from which he was trying to remove his infant son was rear-ended. The boy, Tyler M. Offer of Harrisburg, Pa., died at Sinai Hospital not long after the 3 a.m. accident, which occurred on northbound I-83 between Shawan and Belfast roads in northern Baltimore County.

The father and son were passengers in a car driven by the boy's mother, Erika L. Braun, 19, of Harrisburg. Police said she lost control of her 2001 Mazda 626, which struck the left guardrail and ended up in the right lane of the highway on the downward crest of a hill.

As Ronnel Offer leaned into the car to unstrap his son from his car seat, the Mazda was hit by a 2007 Toyota Prius, police said.

"The crash team is doing an investigation," Sgt. Arthur Betts said yesterday. "That won't be wrapped up for at least a few weeks. Then the cause of the crash will be released."

Two passengers in the Mazda were treated Tuesday at Maryland Shock Trauma Center and released. Braun was taken to Sinai, where she refused treatment.

The driver of the Prius, Joe Y. Nimely, 42, of York, Pa., was treated at Shock Trauma and released. His wife, Celia S. Nimely, 34, a passenger in the Prius, was in fair condition last night at Shock Trauma.