Motorist helps Naperville cops solve hit-and-run ‘mystery’
BY BILL BIRD wbird@stmedianetwork.com March 7, 2013 8:00PM
Edward Allan Poe, 33, faces trial for leaving the scene of a traffic crash in Naperville. | Courtesy of Naperville Police Department
Updated: April 11, 2013 6:42AM
You’ve heard of “The Tell-Tale Heart.” This is the story of “The Tell-Tale Plate.”
Naperville police are crediting an unnamed motorist with helping them solve a hit-and-run traffic crash mystery involving a man with an almost famous name.
Edward Allan Poe, 33, who listed an address in Aurora, is free on bond. He faces trial in DuPage County Circuit Court on charges of leaving the scene of an accident involving damage to an attended vehicle, driving with a suspended license and following another vehicle too closely, according to court records.
Poe — whose name is not to be confused with that of the late American mystery writer, Edgar Allan Poe — surrendered just before 11 p.m. Feb. 27 at the Naperville police station in connection with the crash, which occurred in early October.
Police Sgt. Lou Cammiso said Poe is from Wisconsin, and recently has been “staying with various friends and relatives” in the Naperville area. “He was driving a borrowed car during the hit-and-run, and returned the car without reporting the accident to the police or the owner,” Cammiso wrote Thursday in an e-mail.
The car’s license plate number was obtained from the driver whose vehicle was damaged, Cammiso said. Poe was subsequently identified as having been the driver during the crash, and police obtained a warrant for his arrest, Cammiso said.
Court records indicated Poe served 82 days in DuPage County Jail on an October 1997 charge of criminal trespass to state-supported property. He also spent 50 days in jail for a July 1998 attempt to bring a firearm, ammunition or explosive into a penal institution in West Chicago, court records showed.
Poe’s arraignment is set for Monday in the alleged hit-and-run case.
