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SARATOGA SPRINGS — A social media mix-up left a high school senior trying to explain to his friends why police were seeking him as a suspect in a hit-and-run crash.
“I have had a parking violation and that is it,” West Lake High School student Matthew Campbell said of his criminal history.
Matthew Campbell, 18, said a classmate shared a shocking image with him early Thursday afternoon.
“I was actually in my woodworking class and someone walks up and shows me the post and apparently it already made the rounds around the school,” he said.
Matthew Campbell said he certainly remembers the night of Dec. 20 when he accidentally clipped a woman with his sideview mirror in the parking lot of the Walmart in Saratoga Springs.
“I guess she walked right into it and knocked it off, and I stopped immediately, got out and tried to help her up. I still feel terrible about it, an elderly lady,” he said.
The woman thought she was OK and, according to Campbell, didn’t want to exchange contact information or call the police.
But eventually, the woman began having pain and filed a police report, leading detectives to ask other police agencies for help. Somehow in the process, the case was mistakenly labeled as a hit-and-run, which was upsetting to Matthew Campbell’s father.
“The fact it got posted as a hit-and-run, when really this was nothing more than an exchange of insurance information at that point,” said Jared Campbell, Matthew’s father.
Matthew Campbell immediately went to the school resource officer and worked everything out with Saratoga Springs police in just a few minutes. The city sent out a tweet clearing Matthew Campbell of any wrongdoing. However, he said the Provo police tweet was not deleted until late Thursday night.
Saratoga Springs police said they apologized for the mix-up and Campbell’s insurance information has been provided to the victim.
Provo police said they were only trying to help a neighboring department and simply shared the information that was given to them.
Matthew Campbell said he hopes the woman is going to be OK, and that anyone who saw the tweet Thursday will now understand the rest of the story.
“You know it is weird to have to tell the story multiple times just so people know that you are not this someone who ran someone over and drove away,” he said.
