Injury Slight as Seizure Causes Crash

A 41-year-old Anaheim man escaped serious injury Monday after an epileptic seizure caused him to lose control of his car and careen back and forth across the Riverside Freeway before crashing into a building at the roadway’s edge, authorities said.

Richard Dericks told paramedics that he was on the westbound freeway on-ramp west of State College Boulevard on his way home at about 11:50 a.m. when the seizure struck, causing him to inadvertently jam the accelerator, said Officer Lyle Whitten of the California Highway Patrol.

Dericks’ car went over a curb and a Caltrans sign, hit the center divider and bounced back across all three lanes of traffic and ran down an embankment before crashing through a chain-link fence and into the Terminix Termite building at the freeway’s edge, Whitten said.

Dericks, who was not wearing a seat belt, was taken to a hospital with only a minor cut to his forehead but complaining of pain, Whitten said. No one inside the building was injured, Whitten said.

“He was very lucky. The fence slowed him down, and he ran into a storage area of the building,” Whitten said. “Three-fourths of his car was inside the building before he stopped. The manager of the building said it felt like an earthquake hit.”

The crash caused substantial structural damage to the two-story building at 1401 N. Baxter St., and it was closed temporarily by the Fire Department, Whitten said.

Whitten said Dericks had not taken his medication.