Ever thought of writing a complaint to the police after being held up waiting for them to clear up a traffic accident?

In a rare occurrence, Public Works and Traffic Minister Pedro Castro did just that Tuesday.

A collision between a semi-trailer rig and a truck at 8:50 a.m. Tuesday left one person dead and snarled traffic on the San Jose-Santa Ana road in front of the Pequeño Mundo discount goods store for six hours.

The judicial investigators took until 11 a.m. to remove the body, but did not allow reopening of the road until 3 p.m., reported the national newspaper La Nacion. (It is routine for OIJ to investigate the scene where anyone dies a violent death.)

“OIJ (the judicial police) delayed us,” Castro told La Nacion, “We were ready to open the street a lot earlier. I said to the director of the Traffic Police that I’d write a note to OIJ asking them, when something like this happens, please work with more urgency.”

Castro is the new Minister of Public Works and Traffic and the Traffic Police are under his jurisdiction. “The cost to the country to have a thoroughfare like this closed for hours and hours is enormous,” he added, “We, like the Police, put forth effort to arrive as soon as possible and we hope they will do the same.”

It is most unusual for one government agency to criticize another in this country and Castro’s concern for public’s convenience came as a refreshing change for motorists.

The court press office responded with the usual denial that they had yet to receive the Castro protest note. (This is standard, indicating that no one wants to deal with the issue and they wish it would go away.)

But the press office did tell La Nacion that the amplitude of the accident, involving two streets, took OIJ agents longer than usual. The office added that they had to use special equipment, such as three dimensional scanners, to recreate the accident.

It appears that the truck-trailer was heading to Santa Ana when a mechanical failure caused it to knock down an electric pole and rebound into the other lane where it hit the truck.

The truck driver Jairo Rocha, 47, died at the scene. The driver of the semi-rig’s tractor told his boss that he heard what sounded like an explosion and immediately lost control. He was hospitalized in stable condition.