More charges filed against driver in crash with Raleigh bus

Joseph Mederious Craveiro, 63, whose address is listed as a homeless shelter on Wilmington Street, was previously charged with felony hit-and-run, misdemeanor hit-and-run, driving while impaired, driving with license revoked and failing to stop at a red light. Police have also charged him with leaving the scene of an accident with property damage, speeding, reckless driving and not displaying a license plate on his vehicle.

He was being held in the Wake County jail under a $50,000 bond.

Police said Craveiro was involved in a hit-and-run at the intersection of McDowell and Morgan streets on Dec. 28 and subsequently hit the bus near the intersection of Edenton and Hillsborough streets.

The bus then swerved into a power pole and came to rest on the grounds of Edenton United Methodist Church. About 14 people were on the bus at the time, and a warrant states that three suffered serious injuries.

The car Craveiro was driving was registered to Mike Nunn of Fuquay-Varina. Nunn said Tuesday that Craveiro was staying at his house after getting out of jail on Christmas Day following a six-month stint for violating his probation on previous larceny charges.

Before Craveiro went to jail, Nunn said, he agreed to give the car to Nunn for his niece to use. When Craveiro was released, Nunn asked him not to drive the car until he could turn in the license plate and have his name taken off the title.

But when Nunn awoke on Dec. 28, the car was gone, he said.

Because he was paralyzed as a passenger in a car accident 16 years ago, Nunn said hearing that Craveiro may have seriously injured people in a crash hits home for him.

"To everybody that got hurt in this accident, to you I sincerely apologize, and I'm sorry that this happened," he said. "I wish I could have prevented it, but there was just nothing I could do to prevent it."

Downtown Raleigh traffic was snarled for more than six hours after the wreck.

Craveiro also still faces charges of assaulting an officer in connection with a Jan. 24, 2015, incident in which two Raleigh police officers were dragged across a convenience store parking lot when they tried to question a driver about a car that had no license plate but had drug paraphernalia inside.

Nunn said he hopes that Craveiro will get the help he needs.

"He's not a bad guy – he's not a murderer, he's not a rapist, he's not a killer – he's just a guy who can't seem to stay out of trouble," Nunn said.