I have the forensic reports from the accident Matthew Rushin had. I have transcripts from body cams now. Here is what really happened. On January 4, 2019, Matthew was going to Panera Bread to get pastries. And to see his girlfriend who worked there. This was a routine for him.
As he is pulling in, a man at a stop sign begins to pull out. Matthew had the right of way. Their front left bumpers graze each other. Matthew maintained the entire time that the other man hit him. Police continue to say “the man you hit,” and Matthew continues to correct them.
“No, he hit me.” Matthew pulls off to the side and waits. And waits. The man is illegally sitting in an intersection. For minor accidents, people are supposed to move out of traffic. The man would not move. Matthew tries to prompt the man to get out of the intersection.
He pulls off to the side even more hoping to prompt the man to get out of the intersection. The man doesn’t move. This is when Matthew “freaks out” (his words). He didn’t know what to do because the man was in traffic. The man corroborates this (he sat there and called his wife)
Matthew pulls onto First Colonial Road. At the next intersection, he makes a U-turn because he knows even if it wasn’t his fault, he has to return to the scene. He is stressed and trying to do his breathing exercises. (Cont)
He gets to the intersection where he needs to turn, at Laskin Rd and First Colonial. He is “bawling my eyes out,” it’s dark, it’s raining, and there is standing water on the road. He tries to turn where he needed to to get back to Panera, but he gets confused here.
He says he was past the median, but somehow he couldn’t understand, he was still in oncoming traffic. Here is how police demonstrated the accident. This didn’t gel with the “black box” forensics report, though. Matthew’s testimony sheds new light. 
Police allege that at this intersection, Matthew just drives into oncoming traffic. But the car he hit was not the first car he passed. He avoided some cars. Here is what that intersection actually looks like. Note, Matthew says he had never used this road before.
See how there is oncoming traffic from a service lane (red circle) and then oncoming traffic from three other lanes (teal circle)? Matthew misunderstood the intersection. He says he was making the turn properly, but he was somehow facing traffic. He didn’t see where to turn.
He says he tried to go back to going straight, but he didn’t have enough time and room to right his course. He says when he tried to go straight again (pointing back to First Colonial) but didn’t get past the median. He said he was facing traffic again. (Images from Google maps)
Note these images are not from the night of the crash. I took them from Google to demonstrate the scene. What was most confusing me was that the forensics report (which didn’t even come back until after he was charged with attempted murder) recorded a non-deployment event.
That means the airbags did not go off for the event recorded on the black box. Matthew says in his testimony, multiple times, that he was trying to get to the grass on the median to stop. The "black box" says four events happened after the recorded event, all deployment events.
This means there was an impact that did not damage the body of Matthew’s SUV, then within the next few seconds, there were four impacts. Now, it made sense. He said he was trying to hurry and get on the median to stop his truck. I read about black boxes and how they work.
And how they are often misrepresented in court or misinterpreted. A vehicle can record hitting road kill or a pot hole before an accident, and that would be a non-deployment event. For Matthew, I believe, his non-deployment event was hitting the curb of the median.
Instead of hopping up onto the curb, or crossing over it, he bounced off of it and was sent back into traffic whereupon he crashed into another car. Police mention having red light cameras, but those were never brought to court. His lawyer never asked for them. Why not?
(more incoming. Posting now to grab a link.)
Look at this article. I posted the videos cops that night would tell Matthew over and over were going to show he intended to drive into traffic. These are the videos that the magistrate used to issue an attempted murder charge hours after the accident.
Look at these videos (linked above) Governor Northam @GovernorVA @OfficialMLK3 @EFillerCorn. Do these show anything?! Some face storefronts! They're not even facing the road! They show absolutely nothing. Why did his lawyer never bring this up? I know why. It's obvious.
I'm getting an independent expert to review the forensic report to verify that my reconstruction is accurate. But what every forensic physicist I called first told me was how the defense would have an independent review of the report. Nope. She never got one. Why not?
But I'm an English major, not an expert in fluid mechanics or physics. If I can see something is off and understand that within minutes, why couldn't Matthew's defense? Because she was promoted to judge after Matthew took a plea?
@GovernorVA you cannot let this police corruption, racism, and disgusting ableism be validated. Matthew is autistic and made a mistake at a confusing intersection. He tried to correct his vehicle. He said that a million times on camera.
When Matthew was alone & didn’t know he was being filmed, he talks to himself. It’s perceptive. @GovernorVA he says, “I didn’t kill anyone and I didn’t want to [...] of course they’re going to listen to [the white witnesses] over a 20-year-old Black male.” #FreeMatthewRushin
