The Post reports that the city is offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the hit and run driver who killed six year old Crysta Spencer at 6th and Orleans on Monday afternoon.
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6 comments:
My heart goes out to the family of this child and I hope the driver does come forward. I have but one question, where were the parents or an adult when the 6 YEAR OLD was crossing a busy road?
I think she was with her mom and darted out into the street. I think I read her mom called out to her to stop. It's heartbreaking. I have two kids, one the same age as the little girl. They have grown up here and yet they still need to be reminded daily of the dangers of cars and the street. They think they're invincible. A kid can take off in an instant and your life is changes forever.
Does anyone know if there is a group doing something for the family? Our kids go to school right around the corner from where this happened and we drive by every day. I'd love to help.
She was not with her mom. Her mom was in the house, upstairs.
She actually saw it happen through the window.
It's heartbreaking.
(Speaking of heartbreaking - I haven't heard a single thing about the $1000 dollar reward and the rape victim off Maryland. Hopefully this incident won't fall by the wayside like that one.)
I really feel for this family. Walking home that day and seeing her sneakers still sitting in the street really wrenched my heart. A neighbor told me that they lost an older girl some time ago in a shooting. If nothing else, I hope the person who hit her comes forward.
In addition to all this talk of speedbumps and traffic improvments to protect pedestrians- the schools and parents have to reinforce to the children, (who then grow up to be adults who jaywalk and step out into traffic and get hit by busses) basic safety.
I routinely watch the parents of some of the kids in this same neighborhood stand around talking while their kids play football from one side of the street to the other. Granted we don't have much in the way of sidewalks. Last week I was really worried for 2 little girls on roller skates (who couldn't completely control themselves) weave in and around the parked cars during rush hour while a group of adults stood there watching them. I wanted to say something-but was worried that their parents would take my concern as condescension. I really wish I had.
Hopefully we'll all take something from this horrible accident.
Hi all,
Does anyone know if there is a foundation or way to give donations to this child's family to offset funeral costs? If not, I was thinking of sending a sympathy note with a check inside.
I live a block away on Orleans PL and feel terrible for this family. I agree with all the posts. The kids on this street seem to run freely and in fact DO cause a traffic hazard. At the same time, city officials seem to be woefully haphazard in their enforcement of speed and stop sign laws in this area and, for better or for worse, these urban kids sometimes use the street as a playground. It may be a parent's problem, but to me it seems like a shared responsibility. After all, where else do these kids have to go and play?
A tricky intersection like that should at least get some occasional police oversight -- a traffic officer issuing speeding tickets, for instance.
All the reports seem to acknowledge that Crysta ran out into traffic from between parked cars, so it's hard to say how easily even speed limits would have helped (but a stop sign should have been there, with the number of kids in this area).
Don't want to bury my main question, which is: any thoughts or information on how to help this family?
Thanks, Faye
As others have pointed out, the real problem here is a total lack of enforcement of speed limits and traffic laws in DC. I've lived on the Hill for 10 years and I don't think I've EVER seen a DC cop give an actual traffic ticket. I see US Capitol police do it pretty routinely, even though it's not actually their job.
I've even seen people run red lights right in front of DC cops, but since the cops are hermetically sealed in their cruisers there's no way the driver was getting a ticket.
It's like once their shift starts their car doors develop a vacuum seal that can't be broken until they leave the neighborhood at the end of the shift, so the officer must remain in the car, blissfully unaware of the actual neighborhood around them. This isn't true of all cops, of course, but it is true of far too many.
Decades of this type of lax enforcement has a very real result. People know they can speed, run lights, etc., with absolute impunity.
This accident was tragic, but it sounds like adding a stop sign wouldn't have prevented it. And we can't put stop signs on every corner. Traffic would grind to a halt.
The much better alternative is to have DC cops actually break the vacuum seal on their car doors and step out into the neighborhood to do things like give tickets.
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