Inside NC Highway Patrol incidents linked to deaths, injuries, quiet payouts
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- News & Observer uncovered 10 patrol incidents from 2018–24 tied to deaths and injuries.
- State paid about $4M in settlements and faces a potential $1M judgment on appeal.
- Highway Patrol omitted settlement details, provided few answers to information requests.
Highway Patrol troopers, with their gray uniforms and broad-brimmed campaign hats, are supposed to be the guardians of North Carolina’s highways, stopping dangerous drivers and investigating crashes.
But court filings, interviews and State Highway Patrol reports show that in a small number of cases, troopers have been accused of negligent and reckless actions that led to deaths, injury and lasting trauma for people across North Carolina.
Ten incidents unearthed by the News & Observer involve a tiny fraction of the state’s 1,600 troopers. But they demonstrate the huge consequences of alleged reckless behavior, from ignoring protocol and abandoning common sense.
The incidents, most detailed in court settlements, span back to 2018. Four people died, and seven were hurt. About $4 million in settlements have been paid out so far, and another $1 million judgment could come, depending on the outcome of an appeal.
There may be more. After the News & Observer requested settlement agreements linked to allegations of trooper misconduct, the Highway Patrol provided a list that didn’t include details and omitted at least five settlement payments that the N&O identified independently.
A Highway Patrol spokesman declined to respond to questions about the cases, including the agencies’ practices after troopers are accused of not following protocol and whether any internal changes resulted from reviews of the incidents. As well as why some of the settlements weren’t released after a public information request.
Below are summaries of the incidents involving members of the public accusing Highway Patrol members of dangerous behavior from court records, Highway Patrol documents and interviews. All fit into three categories: incidents where people died, were offered the chance to have criminal charges dropped if they didn’t sue, or were injured.
The N&O alerted the Highway Patrol that it would report these specific incidents and asked if troopers still employed wished to comment. The N&O attempted to reach out to those no longer with the Highway Patrol directly and made contact with most.
Left at roadside drunk, with a gun
On May 23, 2022, Joshua Castro swerved off the road and crashed into a ditch along North Carolina 42 in Asheboro. Another driver found Castro unconscious and covered in his own vomit, states a lawsuit filed by his family about a year later to the state Industrial Commission.
EMS and firefighters responded to the Randolph County wreck, finding an uncooperative and stumbling Castro who smelled of alcohol. Castro told officials about a concealed weapon in the waistline of his jeans, which a Randolph deputy removed and later gave to Trooper Danny King.
King gave Castro a portable breath test, which indicated Castro’s inebriated level was twice the legal limit. King cited Castro for DWI, but didn’t take him into custody, which was within his discretion, according to testimony from his superiors.
Castro had refused to ride in the ambulance that responded. King offered to take Castro somewhere, but he repeatedly refused, King said in the Industrial Commission hearing.
King gave Castro his gun back, in two pieces, and drove off. Within the hour, Castro put the gun back together, shot himself on the right side of his head and died later at the hospital.
- Lawsuit: Industrial Commission Deputy Commissioner Tiffany Smith awarded Castro’s family a $1 million judgment in July 2025. The North Carolina Attorney General’s Office appealed the judgment. A hearing was held recently in front of the full Industrial Commission panel, but a decision hasn’t been issued yet.
- Trooper: King, hired in 1998, is still employed as a master trooper. Court records indicate that Highway Patrol officials counseled him but he was not disciplined.
Shooting leads to $2.2 million settlement
Around 9 p.m., Brandon Webster and his girlfriend, Whitney McKeithan, left his parents’ house for a nearby mini-mart in Shallotte on Jan. 1, 2019. Minutes later, Webster returned bloody, shot by a trooper.
Trooper Scott Anthony Collins had tried to pull over Webster, 28, on a nearby road, according to a lawsuit. After both vehicles stopped in the mini-mart parking lot, Webster ignored Collins’ commands and tried to run him over, Collins claimed, according to the lawsuit. Collins fired twice into the driver’s side door, striking Webster. Gov. Josh Stein, then state attorney general, announced a few months later that “Collins acted reasonably in the face of a deadly threat” and no charges would be filed against him.
But a federal lawsuit his family filed in late 2020 argued Collins shot Webster as he was driving around the officer and out of the parking lot. Webster’s parents drove him to the hospital, where he died.
- Lawsuit: Federal court approved $2.2 million settlement between Webster’s family and McKeithan in 2022. The settlement is the highest on the list, by total settlement and broken down per person.
- Trooper: Collins, hired in 2016, left the Highway Patrol in 2021.
Speed kills in Randolph County
On June 4, 2023, Trooper Evan Underwood sped down Old North Carolina Highway 49 in Randolph County at 95 mph — more than twice the speed limit — to a call he didn’t respond to immediately, according to Highway Patrol employment records. Underwood didn’t turn on his lights or sirens, which made it less likely for Helen Garner to see him after she looked both ways before she drove her pickup through a nearby intersection, according to lawsuits.
Underwood’s patrol car slammed into the passenger side of the truck. Garner’s 87-year-old husband, Donald, died five days later.
- Lawsuits: Ended with a $1.7 million settlement.
- Trooper: Underwood was indicted on the criminal charge of misdemeanor death by motor vehicle in January, days before he was fired. In September, Underwood pleaded guilty and was sentenced to deferred prosecution, meaning if he complies with specific requirements, the charges will be dismissed and erased from public view.
Fatal ride in a patrol car
On Aug. 22, 2020, Michael Higgins, an East Carolina University student intern with the Highway Patrol, was on a ride-along with Trooper Omar Romero Mendoza, who took him to a scene of a vehicle crash in rural Pitt County. Romero left the scene to chase a suspected drunk driver. In seconds, he’d sped to 113 mph on a dark, two-lane road he had never traveled on, according to court records.
After Romero lost control, his patrol car launched into the air, struck a utility pole and bounced off trees. Higgins died on the side of the road.
- Lawsuit: Filed in 2022, it was dismissed by a Wilson County judge, but revived by the North Carolina Court of Appeals. The troopers have appealed the ruling to the North Carolina Supreme Court.
- Trooper: A patrol investigation found that Romero had “grossly inefficient job performance.” Romero received a written warning, according to a Highway Patrol report. Romero, hired in 2018, remains employed by the Highway Patrol.
Confronting kids at family home construction site
In September 2019, siblings Xavier and Mahogany Atkinson stopped at the construction site of a Wendell home their mother had just bought. Outside, a tall white man — later identified as Trooper Sgt. Sean Luther Bridges — yelled at the brother and sister, who are Black, and complained about the loud ATV. He ordered them to turn it off and accused them of trespassing, a lawsuit states. The teens told Bridges, who was off duty and out of uniform, that it was their family’s house, but he did not believe them and accused them of trying to run over him, the lawsuit says.
The lawsuit alleges this: Bridges “slung” Mahogany in a ditch, before sitting on her and saying she was under arrest for assaulting an officer. Bridges told his fiancée to get his walkie-talkie, gun and handcuffs. When Xavier tried to help his sister, Bridges‘ fiancée hit Xavier in the back of the head with a walkie-talkie. An ambulance took Xavier to the hospital. Mahogany was held by the Johnston County Sheriff’s Office but wasn’t charged.
Days after the incident, Derek Mobley, then a Highway Patrol first sergeant, approached the teens’ mother, according to a recording published by the Indy Week. In it, Mobley is heard saying he could protect the family from criminal charges being filed against her children if they don’t file a lawsuit.
- Lawsuits: Settled for $232,500 in April 2021.
- Trooper: Bridges, a trooper since 1999, left the Highway Patrol in April 2023. Bridges told the N&O only that he was retired and was not disciplined. Two months after Mobley, hired in 1997, spoke to the mother, he was promoted from a first sergeant to a lieutenant and received a $9,000 raise. He left the Highway Patrol in 2024.
Punched, dragged during a medical crisis
On May 25, 2024, Thomas Simmons had an epileptic seizure in his car, but Trooper Sgt. Ashley Smith concluded he was on drugs and later misrepresented evidence supporting that claim, according to a federal lawsuit filed this year. Instead of providing medical aid, Smith punched Simmons in the face, dragged him across gravel and concrete by the ankle, and handcuffed him while he lay dazed and bleeding, the lawsuit states.
Sgt. Smith charged Simmons with assaulting an officer and resisting arrest. Simmons attended criminal court hearings for nearly a year before prosecutors offered to dismiss the charges — but only if Simmons waived his right to sue the trooper, the suit contends. Simmons refused. The charges eventually were dropped.
- Lawsuit: Pending.
- Trooper: Smith, hired in 2004, is still employed with the Highway Patrol.
Protection after a sexual relationship
In November 2022, Trooper Erick Bowen pulled over an 18-year-old woman in Vance County, charged her with DWI and soon initiated a sexual relationship with her, criminal court records and an interview with the local district attorney revealed. Bowen then persuaded an assistant district attorney to drop the charge, according to statements in court.
In May 2024, the woman again drove drunk around 12:30 a.m, this time striking a Ford SUV on Interstate 85 in Vance County, court records say. It was driven by Anthony Chase, a father of eight on his way to work as a Walmart manager.
The crash broke Chase’s neck, ribs, and both shoulders and caused a severe brain injury that required surgeons to remove a quarter of his skull, Chase told The N&O. Once a dad who worked out and practiced martial arts with his kids, he now spends most days seated, fighting pain and limited mobility, he said. His family has moved to his mother’s home in Maryland for support.
- Trooper: Bowen, hired in 2020, pleaded guilty in May of this year to obstructing justice and failing to discharge his duties, class-one misdemeanors. He resigned from the Highway Patrol.
Trooper recorded agreeing to lie
Tyrone Mason, 31, died in the early hours of Oct. 7, 2024, after his car slammed into a concrete barrier on Capital Boulevard in Raleigh. Highway Patrol Sgt. Matthew Morrison and Trooper Garrett Macario agreed that the trooper would not tell Raleigh police that he’d pursued Mason. Mason’s mother says she was told no officer chased her son before he died.
What she learned on her own launched a state investigation that revealed the officers’ behavior. Mason’s mother filed a lawsuit accusing Macario of violating her son’s constitutional rights and not rendering aid after the crash.
- Lawsuit: Ongoing.
- Troopers: Macario, who had been with the Highway Patrol since 2019, and Morrison, who had been a trooper since 2012, were fired in June.
False THC allegation after accident
UNC-Wilmington freshmen Raylee Grieco was driving back to campus from her hometown of Raleigh in February 2024 when she clipped a car parked in the travel lane on Interstate 40 in Duplin County. The crash led to the death of Mildo Velasquez, who was working under a trailer, also parked in the lane, according to a lawsuit filed by Grieco.
Trooper Jamie Duff gave Grieco a roadside breath test that turned up no evidence that she had been drinking. At a Kenansville hospital, a nurse also found no signs of impairment and gave her hydrocodone for her injuries, including a concussion, according to the lawsuit.
Four hours later, Sgt. Devin Rich, a “drug-recognition expert,” arrived and ran “field tests,” which included having her follow a pencil with her eyes and touch her nose with her eyes closed. Despite her injuries and her family advising that a nurse practitioner had ordered Grieco receive a strong pain medication, Rich concluded she showed signs of marijuana use, the lawsuit says. Troopers charged her with DWI.
A Highway Patrol news release the next day said a drug evaluation “confirmed the presence of THC,” prompting inaccurate headlines and social media posts calling her a murderer. UNC-W suspended her. Five months later, blood test results showed no signs of marijuana, and the DWI charge was dismissed. In October, Grieco pleaded guilty only to failure to reduce speed.
- Lawsuit: A civil lawsuit filed in Wake County court in February has been moved to federal court
- Troopers: Duff, hired in 2010, and Rich, hired in 2007, are still employed by the Highway Patrol.
Taken to the ground at wreck scene
On Aug. 10, 2018, Crystal Broadie was driving her Mercedes on I-85 in Gaston County when a tractor-trailer struck her. Troopers Barry Dwight Michael and Christopher Wade arrived and questioned whether she had been drinking and whether she owned the car, whose tag had been transferred from another vehicle.
Rather than verify the registration, the lawsuit states, the troopers grabbed Broadie, wrestled her to the ground and arrested her. She lost her job at FedEx and remained unemployed for two years, the lawsuit she filed in 2021 states.
In court filings, state attorneys allege Broadie resisted arrest.
- Lawsuit: Dismissed in November 2023 in exchange for a $50,000 settlement.
- Troopers: Wade, hired in 2016, was suspended in February 2021 for reasons not specified in Highway Patrol employment records. He left the Highway Patrol April 2021. Michael, hired in 2005, remains a master patrol trooper.
Virginia Bridges covers criminal justice in the Triangle and across North Carolina for The News & Observer. Her work is produced with financial support from the nonprofit The Just Trust. The N&O maintains full editorial control of its journalism.
This story was originally published December 18, 2025 at 5:30 AM.
