Conn. Police Officer Back on Job Nearly Year after Horrific On-Duty Crash

It has been a year since the day that changed Officer James O’Donnell’s life. On Monday, he returned to duty for the Farmington Police Department 364 days after he was severely injured by a fleeing suspect in a stolen car.

O’Donnell walked into the Farmington Police station to report for his first patrol shift since the crash. He was met by a parking lot full of fellow officers and public safety compatriots lined up to shake his hand and celebrate his recovery from serious injuries sustained in an incident on Sept. 20, 2021.

“It’s incredible, absolutely incredible. I can’t express enough my gratitude to everyone from town, and the community of the town has really been supportive, but I mean the police department, as you can see, and the surrounding police departments have been absolutely fantastic,” O’Donnell told media after seeing the reception of his peers.

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The event was initially broadcasted as a surprise, but he said he knew something was going on since he was not put right back on the midnight shift and all of his friends were coming to the department. Still, he was not expecting the type of reception he received.

Farmington Police Chief Colin Ryan said his return in just a year was “remarkable.”

“A lot of people could [have] easily said ‘that’s a road that I don’t really want to go down’ and just take your time and retire and walk away,” Ryan said. “That was never Officer O’Donnell’s intent. It was consistently about ‘when can I come back?’ and every update he gave me and gave the command staff was always about ‘I will be back.’ You can’t do that without willpower, and [he] certainly has that.”

Ryan called his return a “huge boost” to department morale. He said that things like his injury can affect officers and make them question why they do the job.

“When you see a guy grind like that to get back, it reinvigorates you,” Ryan said.

O’Donnell was injured during a patrol shift last September after being called to a condominium complex for a reported catalytic converter theft.

He was the first to arrive at the scene and pulled up near the driver’s side of a Nissan, thinking he boxed in the stolen vehicle. He got out of his cruiser and pointed his gun at the suspect and ordered the driver of the Altima to stop, according to court records.

The suspect then pulled away from the cruiser and “surged” forward, hitting O’Donnell and pinning him between the cruiser and the Nissan, crushing the officer’s lower body. Responding officers attempted to pursue the Altima but found it abandoned, still running, less than two blocks away, records said. The entire incident was captured on video, according to court records.

O’Donnell broke his right foot in two places, suffered four fractures to his pelvic bone and shattered his sacrum, a small bone located near the bottom of the spine. He had to go through three surgeries for his injuries and now has a screw implanted in his sacrum.

“It was really slow and a very tedious and very trying process,” O’Donnell said. “I had to relearn how to walk and change how I did things, had couple setbacks, which put my return later than I expected for myself, so that was a little difficult, but I still got through it and it’s an amazing feeling to get through all that.”

He is not completely pain-free yet, he said. There is still some physical therapy for his foot to come, but he is healthy enough that he can do his job without issue, he said. He went on a two-mile run Sunday just to make sure his body was ready to come back, he said.

“I’m not as flexible as I used to be, but I’ll get there,” O’Donnell joked.

O’Donnell said it was his fellow officers that helped get him through it and motivated him to get back to work. He said his phone has not stopped “blowing up” with messages from his coworkers checking in on him from the time he was initially hospitalized to now.

“I couldn’t stumble and fall and not come back,” O’Donnell said. “I had to be back because these guys supported me, the town supported me. And I think my wife would not be very pleased with me if I didn’t reach my goals.”

O’Donnell has two children with his wife, Kris, a 3-year-old son, Andrew, and a 1-year-old daughter, Saoirse. He is also pursuing a Master’s degree in digital forensics, which he expects to complete this fall. He is planning to become a detective someday but said he must get back to where he was before the incident first.

The suspect in the crash, later identified as Pedro Acevedo of New Britain, was arrested in a separate stolen vehicle investigation in Plainville a few days after the Farmington incident. According to court records, he remained in custody while detectives and forensics experts examined DNA, cellphone data and video footage that appear to put Acevedo at the exact spot of the crash.

Acevedo was arrested and charged by the Farmington Police Department for the incident with O’Donnell on Oct. 5, 2021.

Acevedo faces several charges, including first-degree assault, assault of a public safety officer, first-degree reckless endangerment, second-degree larceny, fourth-degree larceny, sixth-degree larceny, reckless driving and evading responsibility resulting in serious physical injury.

Acevedo’s case is in pre-trial. He is set to appear in court next on Oct. 5. He pleaded not guilty to the charges in this case, according to Attorney Kirsten Coffin, who is representing him.

“We wish [O’Donnell] well,” Coffin said, declining further comment for this story.

Acevedo, who has a criminal history dating back to 2007, also has pending cases in Milford, Rockville and New Britain courts.

There are other people involved in the investigation, but no further arrests have been made yet, Ryan said.

“The criminal case will take care of itself. We have outstanding investigators that have already worked diligently to get some people that were involved in custody,” Ryan said. “There are many ongoing parts of that case. The court has a lot of that right now, so a lot of that will come from them.”

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