First: the gory details can be found at
https://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...ys/4802119001/
The short version is that Bradley was struck by the side of a moving vehicle which caused him to hit a stationary vehicle.
In a past life I was a firefighter and EMT in a very rural area with poor cellular service. I left that position in 2011 and those two factors may have greatly reduced the number of collisions I saw which were caused by vehicles operated while using a mobile device. I have personally provided medical care on scene for over 100 Vehicular Collisions. Note well that we never called them accidents. The dictionary I consulted states that an accident is "
an event that happens by chance or that is without apparent or deliberate cause." That does not describe most of the collisions where I have been on scene.
In my experience about 75% of VC incidents were attributable to DUII. Most were alcohol. A few were meth. I also saw a few where there was poly -pharma, mostly meth + something to bring the driver down. None were purely cannabis, and there was a fair amount of cannabis use in our district, In spite of the fact that this happened in St. George Utah it is not possible to rule that out without seeing the vehicle operator's blood alcohol and drug analysis. The description above makes that an unlikely cause, but still possible.
The next most frequent cause of vehicular collisions was adverse weather. The weather in St. George that day did not look too bad. It is possible that there was some ice or snow on the road but not likely. There had only been a trace amount of precipitation over the past three weeks and high temperature for the day was 50F. I doubt that this was adverse weather.
Third on my list was driver inattention. We actually had people just plain drive off the road because they were looking at the scenery. We had one driver hit a stopped school bus because they were fiddling with their vehicle's audio system. Yes, big, yellow, flashing red lights. Go figure! This is not a vision issue.
Beyond that I have seen at least three incidents which I might classify as accidents. Two drivers who became incapacitated due to cardiac arrest and one who became incapacitated due to a diabetic low blood sugar event. The vehicle which hit Bradley was not driven by someone who had such an event.
If I was investigating this incident I would be checking for drugs and / or alcohol, then checking cell phone records. I highly doubt that the driver of the vehicle which appears to have caused the collision to be accurate.