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State police charged a 21-year-old Blairsville man with driving under the influence of alcohol after, they say, he crashed and abandoned a car Jan. 21 in Derry Township.
When a person walking along Torrance Road noticed a damaged white Kia sedan sitting along the Conemaugh River bank the next morning, multiple fire departments from both counties, river rescue units and police departments were dispatched to search the area.
Trooper Gregory Frank said initial responders found no operator but did locate footprints in the snow leading back up to the rural road. Frank said troopers, working with Blairsville police Chief Michael Allman, later identified the woman who owned the car, but she reported her boyfriend, Mitchell Lee Hillis of Blairsville, had been driving it.