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Police have charged a 21-year-old Alliston man in connection with an OPP cruiser collision Feb. 24. The man is charged with Turn Not in Safety, under the Highway Traffic Act. The collision happened on Church Street South in Alliston at about 5 p.m. A cruiser, responding to an emergency call on Albert Street, was northbound on the road and came up to a line of three cars. The cruiser had its lights and sirens activated, but the cars did not move out of the way, police said. The officer pulled out to pass and as he was approaching the front of the line, the lead car in the group, a Honda Civic, turned left, and into his path. Both cars spun out into the west ditch, with the cruiser slamming into a sign for PPG Canada. The driver of the Civic was taken to hospital with minor injuries. The officer was not hurt. OPP Det. Sgt. Tim Melanson said it is the responsibility of the driver to ensure there is no traffic coming in either direction before making a turn into another lane. Melanson said the charge would have been the same if the Civic had turned in front of a civilian vehicle that was legally passing. "If it was a regular car that had done the same thing, it would have been no different," he said. Everett resident Ken Pratt was driving northbound not too far behind where the accident happened, and saw it unfold. He said he saw the cruisers behind him as early as when he was on Industrial Parkway, and pulled over when they came up to him. "They were going very fast," said Pratt. "(The cruiser) pulled out to go around them, and the next thing I saw was (the cruiser) going into the PPG driveway." Pratt saw a big splash of water, and assumed the cruiser had hit a puddle on the road. When he drove by and saw the cruiser has smashed into the sign, he assumed the car had lost control when it hit the puddle. Pratt said he didn’t see that another car was hit, and didn’t realize until he later read it in the newspaper. Pratt said the cruiser was travelling in a group with two other police cars. He said they all had their emergency lights on, but he doesn’t remember if the sirens were on or not. He said the narrow road made it difficult for vehicles to get all the way onto the shoulder. He said he doesn’t know how fast the cruisers were driving, but said he thought the officers were responding appropriately to an emergency call. "It was an unfortunate thing. You’re in the wrong spot at the wrong time. I think everybody was trying to do their best," he said. Melanson said the 21-year-old also could have been charged with failure to move for an emergency vehicle, but police opted not to pursue additional charges. E-mail reporter Kurtis Elsner at [email protected]