CRANBERRY TWP — Police arrested a township man after a hit-and-run accident where he allegedly struck a pedestrian Thursday evening on Haine School Road.

Michael Mesecke, 25, was arrested Thursday night and taken to Butler County Prison, said Sgt. Chuck Mascellino of Cranberry Township Police. He was later released on $25,000 unsecured bail following an arraignment Friday morning.

Mesecke is being charged with accident involving death or injury, failure to give information or render aid and reckless driving.

Police responded around 7:20 p.m. to the intersection of Lincolnshire Drive and Haine School Road where a 19-year-old woman was struck from behind by a car. Police said she was jogging on the side of the road when she was hit.

“I heard a loud bang, and I thought someone hit my mailbox again,” said Keith Frazier, whose front yard became the scene of the accident. “It really scared me because I wasn’t sure she was alive.”

Neighbors rushed onto the scene to help while they waited for emergency responders to arrive, each having witnessed a part of what had happened, Frazier said.

Linda Graham-Love, who lives across the street from where the accident occurred, said the woman was coherent and able to talk as she was loaded into an ambulance.

The victim, a Cranberry resident, was taken by ambulance to Allegheny General Hospital for treatment and was released, police said. Mascellino said she appeared to have just bumps and bruises, no broken bones.

“She was very lucky, obviously,” he said.

Without witnesses who stopped to help the victim and tried to identify the car and driver, police wouldn’t have been able to find the driver, Mascellino said.

Witness accounts and evidence left at the scene led police to believe the vehicle involved was a maroon Toyota Scion XB with damage to the passenger side headlight and mirror.

After putting out a call for information on Facebook, the vehicle was found at a township residence around 10 p.m. by an officer on patrol.

Mesecke said he had been drinking that night, but he could not be charged with DUI because too much time had passed between the accident and when he was arrested, Mascellino said.

“He did not recall striking anybody,” Mascellino said.

Traffic collisions are increasingly common on Haine School Road, said Frazier, who has lost numerous mailboxes and yard decorations over the years to reckless drivers.

“They (motorists) hit my mailboxes all the time,” said Frazier.

It happened so regularly that Frazier would make them out of railroad ties and a large stone, until a nasty crash left a station wagon totaled and his mailbox still destroyed.

“Luckily no one was killed,” he said.

Now, he makes them as light as he can to avoid adding danger to the next inevitable collision.

“This road since they repaved it is like a race course. Especially here, because you start up the hill or down the hill and they just zoom,” said Frazier. “They don’t slow down even for the lights. I think what they need is another set of stop signs to slow them down.”