A Jupiter police officer was seriously injured while on duty when the driver of a vehicle traveling alongside his patrol car on Interstate 95 fell asleep behind the wheel.
Officer Jason C. Starks, 34, was taken to St. Mary's Medical Center in West Palm Beach after the wreck, which happened just after 4:30 a.m. on northbound I-95 just north of the Military Trail entrance ramp in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.
The other driver, Steven Carl Klix, 30, of Stuart, was charged with failure to maintain a single lane. He was not injured.
Starks was released from the hospital Sunday afternoon.
Starks had driving back to Jupiter from the Palm Beach County Jail when the crash occured. He had just dropped off someone after an arrest.
Klix was driving northbound in I-95's inside lane, and Starks was heading in the same direction, but in the inside center lane.
Klix fell asleep, and his 1999 Mercury Marquis drifted into the left shoulder, hitting the concrete barrier wall and then veering into the lane Starks was in, colliding with the front of the 2012 Chevrolet Impala Starks was driving.
Both cars traveled all lanes of traffic to the right across, moving onto the grass shoulder. Klix's car came to a rest there. But Starks's car overturned and collided with a tree before stopping.
Both drivers were wearing seat belts at the time of the wreck, and neither appeared to have been under the influence of alcohol.
Starks, who has been with Jupiter police for about 5 years, is a road patrol officer.
The Impala sustained an estimated $10,000 of damage and the Marquis $5,000.
