MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A Memphis man is still recovering in the hospital days after police say his estranged wife intentionally slammed into his car in front of his home.
Wednesday, police charged Ernestine Lee with attempted first-degree murder and aggravated assault in the crash Saturday on Gentry Avenue in North Memphis.
From his hospital bed at the Regional Medical Center, Mento Harris said he was still in a lot of pain and had no idea why his estranged wife did it.
“All I was doing was parking the car in the yard. I was backing up, and all of a sudden, it happened. Boom, you know,” said Harris.
Harris told us he had emergency surgery to remove his spleen and suffered 12 broken ribs, a punctured lung, and damage to his kidney and liver.
“The pain is bearable because of the painkillers they are giving me, but I’ve missed work and everything. It just ain’t right,” said Harris.
Harris and his girlfriend, Renee Dotson, said Lee had been at their house earlier that evening and tried to break the windows of his Mercury Grand Marquis. When she returned about 20 minutes later, they told police she was in a white SUV and was parked at the end of their street.
Harris said he went to move his car from the street into his yard and pulled into a neighbor’s driveway to turn his car around. He said that is when Lee crashed into the driver’s side of his car and said a neighbor’s camera captured the whole thing.
“I was panicked. I was trying to get to him and see if he was okay, and she backed up and thought she was going to run over me, and she pulled over to his car, and when pulled over there, she told him to die. ‘You are going to die,'” said Dotson.
Harris said he will be in the hospital for at least a few more days and has already begun physical therapy. Lee is being held on a $150,000 bond and will make her first court appearance Thursday.