Officials probing how Texas girl left in car after accident

ODESSA, Texas (AP) – Officials in West Texas are investigating if procedures were followed after a 3-year-old girl was found in the back of a smashed vehicle hours after she had been injured in a car accident.

The girl was found by a tow truck driver after the vehicle she had been riding in was taken to a wrecking yard after the Monday accident in Odessa, KOSA-TV (http://bit.ly/2g7LXpZ ) reported.

The girl was taken to a hospital in Lubbock. The television station reports the girl’s family members say she suffered brain bleeding and is experiencing partial paralysis.

The three agencies that responded to the traffic accident – the Texas Department of Public Safety, the Ector County Sheriff’s Office and Odessa Fire Rescue – did not see the girl on the floor in the backseat of a Jeep Grand Cherokee she had been riding in, said Odessa city spokeswoman Andrea Goodson.

The girl was injured after the man driving the vehicle she was in rear-ended one car and sideswiped another after he failed to control his speed, said the Texas Department of Public Safety.

The agency said that the 3-year-old, from nearby Midland, was not wearing a seat belt at the time of the crash.

The driver, Ever Ortega, from Keyes, Oklahoma, was charged with felony intoxication assault-bodily injury. Jail records did not list an attorney for the 28-year-old Ortega.

A 12-year-old boy who was also in the vehicle was injured in the accident and treated at a local hospital.

Fire department officials said that Ortega and the 12-year-old boy had told firefighters that no one else was inside the vehicle.