Teen hurt in back-to-back wrecks involving Minnesota trooper has ‘severe brain injury’

Back-to-back crashes involving a State Patrol squad car and a wrong-way driver on a central Minnesota highway left five people injured, one of them a 17-year-old with critical injuries who remains in critical condition Wednesday.

The wrecks occurred about 9 p.m. on April 9 in Clear Lake Township on Hwy. 10, the Sherburne County Sheriff’s Office said.

Because of the trooper’s involvement in the crash, the patrol asked that the Sheriff’s Office investigate the case.

According to the Sheriff’s Office:

Dale R. Braun, 70, of St. Cloud, was traveling east on the westbound side of Hwy. 10, crossed over at 70th Avenue to the other side of the highway and was hit broadside by an eastbound pickup truck.

The trooper responding on eastbound Hwy. 70 to 911 calls about the wrong-way driver “when he came upon the two vehicles and was unable to avoid a collision,” a Sheriff’s Office statement read.

“Investigators are examining the possibility that some of the occupants of the vehicles involved in the T-bone [crash] were outside of their vehicles when the second collision occurred,” the statement continued.

Pickup truck driver Blayke Mostad, 17, of Milaca, was in critical condition as of late late Wednesday afternoon at HCMC, a hospital spokeswoman said.

Two passengers were in the pickup. Mostad’s 15-year-old brother, Braxton Mostad, was in satisfactory condition, the hospital spokeswoman said. Thomas Hansen, 19, of Big Lake, Minn., was treated at the scene and released.

The brothers’ sister, Baylie Lesnick, wrote in an online fundraising campaign started on behalf of the family that Blayke Mostad “has undergone multiple surgeries thus far and will have an extremely LONG road ahead of him. He suffered a severe brain injury, spinal cord injury, as well as many broken bones.”

Lesnick said Braxton Mostad suffered a serious eye injury, cuts to his face and a torn anterior crutiate ligament injury in one knee.

Leslick told the Star Tribune late Wednesday that “it is just so important to me that people know [Blayke] was hit by the state trooper [and] was fine after the initial accident.”

The trooper, Ryan Moeser, 36, of Clear Lake, also was treated and released. Braun was hospitalized in St. Cloud with noncritical injuries. Patrol Lt. Mike Lee said Moeser has been placed on administrative leave as the investigation continues.