A Chicago police SUV was involved in an accident that took the life of a 66-year-old man. According to reports from witnesses in the ongoing investigation, the vehicle was driving at about 80 miles per hour when it went through a stop sign and hit the car the man was in, killing him.
The 66-year-old was behind the wheel of a 1998 Honda coupe. The SUV was an unmarked police car. Those who heard the accident said that it sounded like a bomb had gone off in the city.
Police said that the SUV was speeding because they’d gotten a call claiming that gunshots had been fired. They were responding to that call as quickly as they could. They also say that the black box in the SUV shows that both the siren and the lights were on when the wreck happened.
One witness says, however, that although the lights may have been turned on long before the crash, he thought the siren came on just before the SUV ran the stop sign. That witness also noted that he thought the man in the Honda had stopped completely at the intersection before driving into it and being struck.
Although no official conclusions have been reached in the investigation, eyewitness accounts may help shed some light on how the accident played out.
Anyone who has lost a family member in a deadly accident needs to know what rights they have to compensation if negligence or recklessness is determined to be the root cause of the accident that killed a loved one.
Source: ABC Chicago, “Man killed in Roseland CPD crash identified,” Jessica D’Onofrio and Eric Horng, April 04, 2017