BLACKSHEAR, Ga. — A Pierce County Schools bus driver faces 15 charges after crashing her bus the morning of Friday, February 15th with 13 elementary students aboard. Police say 38-year-old Annie Darlene Perritt was intoxicated.
None of the children – ages ranging from four to 12 - were injured in the crash about 7:30 A.M., but some of them reported feeling rattled.
“A little scared,” passenger eight-year-old Sophia Sharpe described her feeling moments before the bus hit a tree at the corner of Bluff Drive and Deer Trail, both unpaved rural roads.
“My friend flipped,” the third grader said.
“The mirror broke off,” said ten-year-old Sage Delille, who added that all of the kids were eventually boarded onto another bus.
Jamie Herrin and his son Gary were parked in his car at the top of Deer Trail where it meets Bluff Drive, waiting for the bus to pick Gary up. He watched the bus, heading east on Bluff Drive, approaching from his left.
“She had stopped from the neighbor’s house right there,” he indicated, “and as soon as she did she just floored it.”
“If she’d been an inch closer, she would have taken the front of our car out,” he said, remarking that he could easily read the lettering on the side of the bus.
Although police haven’t specified details of Perritt’s alleged intoxication, she is charged with 13 counts of endangering a child by driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, one count of driving under the influence of alcohol while driving a commercial vehicle, and one count of failure to drive within single lane.
“She was saying my name wrong,” Sophia Sharpe recalled.
“She opened the door and, like, ‘What did I do?’,” Herrin said. “It was just like she was in a daze or something.”
Pierce County superintendent Dr. Kevin Smith said Perritt has been a school bus driver in the district for eight years and has no prior incidents on her record. Herrin said he and his son have known Perritt for eight years, implying that she likely has driven the route consistently for a long time.
There was no rain and the roads were reportedly dry the morning of the crash.
“There were no road conditions that would prompt any kind of issue,” the superintendent said, adding that the bus, valued between $75,000 and $85,000, is likely a total loss.
“No students were hurt, the driver wasn’t hurt, there were no injuries,” Dr. Smith sighed in relief, “which is really miraculous. We are very thankful for that.”
Herrin, who says his son is still shaken from witnessing the crash up-close, agreed.
“I’m just glad that the good Lord was watching over us, that the young ones were safe,” he said.
Annie Darlene Perritt is suspended from service as a driver, pending dismissal. She is scheduled to be in court Thursday, March 21st.