Fillmore County Amish buggy crash left 4 children hurt: Charges

Amish buggy crash, sister cover-up detailed

Prosecutors have charged a woman they say hit an Amish buggy in southeastern Minnesota last fall, killing two children in the process. Why the charges took so long is a twist in the story, and FOX 9’s Maury Glover has the details.

FILLMOURE COUNTY, Minn. (FOX 9) - A woman is accused of hitting an Amish buggy in Fillmore County, then fleeing the scene as it lay in the ditch with children injured.

Brittany Nicole Edgar, 22, of Spring Valley, faces charges of criminal vehicular operation, careless driving, leaving the scene of an accident, no insurance and providing false information.

Around 9:50 p.m. on Feb. 16, Fillmore County Sheriff's Office Deputy Bryan Guber was parked in a field running traffic radar north of Spring Valley, when he observed a southbound Amish buggy with flashing lights on both the front and back of the buggy as it passed.

At 10:05 p.m., Guber was dispatched to a vehicle versus horse-and-buggy accident, where he found an SUV parked along the east shoulder and a horse and buggy in the west ditch. Upon arrival, the buggy was on its side, and small vehicle parts were in both lanes, plus large parts on the west shoulder and ditch.

While headed to the scene, Fillmore County Sheriff's Office Deputy Brady Meyer observed a white Pontiac Grand Prix with substantial front-end damage traveling southbound on County Road 1 that had a broken passenger side headlight and was not displaying any rear lights.

Meyer stopped the driver, later identified as Edgar, who said she had hit a deer two hours earlier. But unaware she was involved in any previous accident at that point, she received a verbal warning for a lack of headlights and was free to leave.

A short time later, a witness named Joseph told authorities that as he was driving down County Road 1 he saw reflectors lying in the road, and what looked like a crash with a horse. Another SUV passenger, Austin, said that he spoke with the driver of the buggy who stated that he couldn't remember the color of the car that hit them, but that the car drove off, according to charges.

When a white bumper was discovered, Deputy Meyer overhead the information and requested the information from his stop be followed up on.

Deputy Guber spoke with the father of the family who had been driving the buggy, who said he saw two vehicles coming from behind them when "the next thing he knew they were sliding down the ditch on the side of the buggy."

The father, his wife, and four children were all taken to St. Mary’s Hospital, with injuries ranging from bumps and bruises to a skull fracture.

Later that night, around 10:53 p.m., a Fillmore County Sheriff's Office Sergeant located the Grand Prix at a residence on Pleasant Avenue in Spring Valley.

Edgar was contacted shortly after, and asked about the damage to the vehicle, but again said that she had struck a deer.

According to charges, after several observations made by authorities, she admitted she hit a buggy.

Authorities were granted a search warrant to tow the Grand Prix and take Edgar's cell phone, which showed that at 10:17 p.m. she received an instant message from a friend which read, "So is everything OK". At 12:50 a.m., a Facebook instant message was sent from Edgar to another user which read, "Hey! I just got in a car accident please call me...."