Investigators plan to examine data from the “black box” inside the SUV Tiger Woods was driving when he was involved in a rollover crash last Tuesday.
The Associated Press reports the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department executed a search warrant on Monday to retrieve information from the data recorder in the luxury model Genesis SUV.
“They’re going to go through it and see if they can find out what was the performance of the vehicle, what was happening at the time of impact. And with that, they’ll have more information they can attribute to the cause of the accident,” Sheriff Alex Villanueva said during a Facebook Live event on Wednesday. “And that’s all it is. We’ll leave it at that.”
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California allows law enforcement officials to seek search warrants for data recorders of vehicles involved in crashes that result in serious injuries or death.
Later in the Facebook Live, Sheriff Villanueva answered a viewer’s question about why a search warrant was not served to obtain samples of Woods’ blood, which could have shown if any drugs or alcohol were in his system at the time of impact.
“The first step in obtaining a search warrant is you have to have evidence of impairment to continue going down that vein. Without that, you just don’t get the search warrant. You have to establish that probable cause for that,” he explained.
According to a statement released by Woods’ team following the accident, the golf star underwent “a long surgical procedure on his lower right leg and ankle.”
As he recovers from multiple leg injuries, Woods got encouragement from fellow golfers.
He posted on Twitter Sunday: “It is hard to explain how touching today was when I turned on the tv and saw all the red shirts. To every golfer and every fan, you are truly helping me get through this tough time.”
