LAWRENCE — A 24-year-old city woman is in critical condition in a Boston hospital after the car she was driving jumped a curb and struck a tree head on at 270 Canal St. early yesterday morning.
Sandra Guillermo, of 687 Essex St., was treated at the scene by paramedics from Lawrence General Hospital and was taken to the hospital before being airlifted to Massachusetts General Hospital, where officials listed her in critical condition yesterday afternoon.
Police said the crash was reported at 12:18 a.m. When Officer Michael Mangan arrived, he was flagged down by a group of about 20 people who surrounded the demolished 1995 Nissan Maxima.
Both the driver and passenger side air bags deployed, and Guillermo was found leaning over the passenger seat with no seat belt on, police said.
A woman in the passenger seat identified as Mikaila Sinclair told Mangan that she was a medical assistant and was rendering first aid by holding Guillermo's head and neck in a stable position.
The woman told Mangan she had checked Guillermo's vital signs and had found a pulse, police said.
Sinclair told Mangan she had been in a friend's apartment at 270 Canal St. when they heard a loud crash, looked out and saw the crashed car, and then ran outside to help.
Three motorcyclists told Mangan they were riding behind the Maxima traveling west on Canal Street when the car stopped at the stop sign at Canal and Jackson streets.
They told police the car went through the intersection and was accelerating, but not rapidly, when the rear end of the car kicked to the left and the car fishtailed before jumping the curb and hitting the tree.
The three men said they never saw the brake lights come on.
Members of the state police accident reconstruction team were sent to investigate the crash.
