‘He almost killed us’: Woman, child recovering after wreck involving carjacked Mercedes

CHARLOTTE — A woman who was driving a sedan that was struck by a stolen Mercedes Benz Tuesday in the Belmont neighborhood told Channel 9 she was blindsided.

“When he hit me, it was loud,” said the woman, who did not want to be identified. “Like that noise, I will never get out of my head because he hit me hard.”

Her four-year-old son was also in the car. They both were taken to a hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening.

The collision was caught on a security camera at the intersection of Belmont Avenue and Harrill Street in north Charlotte.

The woman said she was still hurting the next day.

“I am in pain at this moment,” she said. “My whole left side just started hurting when I got home.”

She had a cast on her arm where she broke two fingers. Her son got a concussion from the crash.

“The left arm was halfway up in the air, and I turned around to turn him over because his car seat had flipped over in the car,” she said. “He was still buckled up in his car seat so I’m turning him over. “He started crying.”

Charlotte-Mecklenburg police said the suspect carjacked a man in the University City area Tuesday. Officers said they spotted the Mercedes Benz off The Plaza and tried to pull the driver over, but he sped off. There was a brief pursuit.

Police said the suspect, Marshay Washington, tried to run away after the crash but was caught hiding in a recycling bin.

The woman told first responders that she didn’t feel pain. Her only concern was for her son.

“He’s hollering and he’s screaming,” the mother said. “I’m trying to calm him down at the same time. I’m still focused on, ‘Who is this dude in this car? He really almost killed us.’ All I could think was, ‘He almost killed us.’”

Video shows moment pursuit ends in crash in Belmont neighborhood

The mother is thankful police caught the suspect. However, she questions the police tactics and believes it would have been safer to let the suspect go.

“I can think of the ‘if’s, and’s, or but’s,’ about that situation, but this is me and my child,” she said. “I’m thinking about us. I’m not thinking about if it was somebody else ... That man could have killed us.”

Police said they found a gun inside the stolen Mercedes the suspect was driving.