Charlestown, MA — One man was killed by a garbage truck while riding his bicycle in Charlestown, Massachusetts, on April 3. The man was identified as Owen McGrory. Authorities had not released his identity until his family was notified of the accident.
McGrory was hit around 1:45 in the afternoon by a white garbage truck that fled the scene. Authorities were able to locate the vehicle, and charge Ricky Prezioso, the driver, with leaving the scene of an accident causing death.
McGrory was pronounced dead at the scene.
A court date of May 19 has been set for Mr. Prezioso.
Scene of the Accident
Commentary
I’ll start by saying that there’s nothing acceptable about fleeing the scene of an accident. It’s bad for the victim and it’s bad for the person who flees. Having said that, I’ll also say that there is a threshold for the things one can feel while driving in their car. Compare an 18-wheeler that weighs somewhere around 80,000 pounds hitting someone who weighs around 150, to a hatchback hitting a small animal. It isn’t a particularly elegant metaphor, but I think it illustrates the fact that there are cases in which a driver doesn’t know they’ve hit something.
Of course, making that case after hitting a pedestrian becomes harder the smaller the vehicle you’re driving. In this case, I don’t think it holds at all. So then, if one can’t make that argument, the question I would ask would is, why would they run? One would assume it’s because they don’t want others discovering what’s just happened. In this case, a grown man on a bicycle in the middle of the afternoon is not a hard thing to see. This situation is bad enough on its face. And it’s made only worse because the driver was behind the wheel of a commercial vehicle.
— Grossman Law Offices
