By Julie Manganis
Staff writer
—
DANVERS — A now-former employee of an auto body shop pleaded guilty yesterday to crashing into two customers' cars there and then leaving the scene.
Daniel Borowiecki, 28, formerly of Atkinson, N.H., also admitted that his driver's license was under suspension at the time.
Borowiecki was on his way into work at the Ira Collision Center in Danvers on the morning of March 4 when he collided with a Toyota RAV4 and an Audi that were awaiting repairs, prosecutor Patrick Collins told a Salem District Court judge yesterday.
A co-worker who was also arriving for work watched as Borowiecki then turned around and left.
A manager called police, who quickly learned that Borowiecki's license was suspended.
When police called him, he immediately denied being involved in an accident, then hung up on the officer, according to a police report.
Danvers police contacted their counterparts in Atkinson, N.H., who found Borowiecki's car, with heavy front-end damage, parked near his home.
Police also learned that Borowiecki had called his boss twice, the first time just minutes after the accident, to say he'd be late, and then a half-hour later to say he couldn't come to work that day because his mother wouldn't let him use the car.
Defense lawyer Tom Torrisi said his client, a graduate of Andover High School who had attended the University of Massachusetts, had relapsed into drug use after being on methadone for several months.
After he was charged, Torrisi said, his stepmother, who is a doctor, arranged for Borowiecki to return to Poland, where he was born, to undergo opiate-blocking therapy.
Under an unusual arrangement accepted by Judge Sabita Singh, Borowiecki will be allowed to return to Poland and will report to his probation officer by mail during the one year of probation he received yesterday.
