A Hartford mother is dead after police say she lost control and crashed into a tree during a police pursuit on the Merritt Parkway in Orange Saturday.
Asilin Dorsey, 31 was a patient at Gaylord Hospital. Her mother says she was admitted on Tuesday with a traumatic brain injury suffered in a previous accident. State police said Dorsey took a hospital van around 12:30 p.m. and was involved in two pursuits before it ended in the deadly crash.
But Deborah Dorsey said her daughter had trouble walking, had memory loss and could only see out of one eye.
"I don't know what to make of it," she said. "I'm still confused. I don't know how this could happen."
She believes her daughter was not in the right state of mind because of her severe injury and also had many questions as to how she could even have access to the van in the first place.
"How did she get the keys?" asked Deborah Dorsey. "Why wasn't somebody watching her? I was told she could never walk the grounds alone."
According to state police, the van was first pursued by Wallingford Police and after it struck several cars and nearly took out first responders at an accident scene on Route 15, state police began to pursue the van.
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Dorsey lost control of the vehicle at exit 58 and struck a tree where she was pronounced dead at the scene.
Dorsey's family wants people to know that she was not a criminal.
"She was a very good person," her cousin Shelly Hightower said. "A good mother. She loved her family. She loved life. It's very unfortunate, very unfortunate. It was an unnecessary death, it really was."
Hospital officials are working with state police on the investigation.
Police are looking for any witnesses to either the accident or the events leading up to it. If you have any information you can contact State Police Troop I in Bethany.
