OVI crash into home causes extensive damage

A Schiller Road homeowner is dealing with the aftermath of an errant SUV that crashed into his garage and caused extensive structural damage.

Troopers found open containers of alcohol in the woman’s vehicle after they responded around 10:30 p.m. Saturday when the blue sport-utility vehicle veered off the road and drove through a neighbor’s yard before plowing into Jim McCool’s house near Medway.

He and his wife had just gone to bed.

“We heard a really, really loud crash and had absolutely no idea what it was,” he said.

McCool came out to his living room to see a brick wall in shambles where his fireplace used to be. When he opened the door to his garage, he only saw smoke and dust.

The SUV totaled one of the couple’s cars and destroyed his wood shop in the garage.

“It took out the garage door, took out structural brick and two by fours and so forth back there,” McCool said.

The SUV driver, Janice Yount, was trapped inside her vehicle in the garage, according to the Springfield Post of the Ohio State Highway Patrol. She refused sobriety tests and was taken to Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton. Troopers said she will be cited for failure to yield, open container and driving under the influence. It was not her first citation on suspicion of drunken driving, the highway patrol said.

Now, McCool said he is wondering if she has adequate insurance, and how all of the damage will be covered.

“Quite a bit of structural damage to the house. There are lots of cracks in the plaster on that end of the house, my wood shop in the garage is destroyed. … Until we can get somebody out that can really estimate it we’ve got no good idea, but it’s going to be an expensive proposition,” he said.