Last October, a student at the university I work at was struck and killed by a car as she was attempting to cross a four-lane highway that separates the campus from a student apartment complex. Today, the newspaper reports that although the local police forwarded on the case to the prosecutor for possible negligent homicide charges, this appears to have been a routine matter because there was a death involved and the prosecutor promptly denied the request to charge the driver.
The area where the student was killed is not very well lit, it was at 8 p.m. so it would have been relatively dark, and the student was wearing dark clothing. The driver wasn’t drinking or driving excessively fast.
There’s another detail that came out about the accident shortly after the student’s death — she was talking to her roommate (who was in the apartment across the street) while she was trying to cross the street. The roommate was quoted as saying that she was talking to the woman at the time she was hit.
A professor wrote a letter to the student newspaper shortly after the accident urging students to use more caution on cell phones, especially on campus, but its good advice for anyone. My wife and I came just inches from killing a young man who was on a cell phone and stepped out into our lane of traffic without first bothering to look in our direction to see if there were any cars coming.
Death by cellphone would just be an incredibly stupid way to die, so please take care when talking on a cell phone and attempting to do other activities, such as driving or walking in heavily trafficked areas.