Watch: A man is dead after being hit by a truck in a marked crosswalk on Whyte Avenue. As Fletcher Kent explains, witnesses acted quickly to catch the driver.
EDMONTON – A man in his sixties has died, and another man is in police custody facing a number of charges, following two hit and run collisions in south Edmonton.
Police say a pick-up truck hit another vehicle from behind on 63 Avenue just before 6 p.m. Thursday. The driver of the pick-up is said to have fled the scene, heading north on Gateway Blvd., with the driver of the vehicle that was hit in pursuit.
The truck then allegedly hit a 63-year-old man who was crossing Whyte Avenue at 101 Street in a marked crosswalk. The man was taken to hospital where he passed away.
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Witnesses say the driver of the truck tried to leave that scene as well. He was boxed in by several motorists – including the vehicle from the initial hit and run – near 99 Street on Whyte Avenue.
Doris Gratton was one of the witnesses on Whyte Avenue.
“I was scared because I didn’t … see him get hit but I heard … after the couple finished crossing, the woman screamed and her husband ran out to the old man.
“And when the vehicle in front of me moved out of the way I had seen the man who was on my left side laying on the ground and he wasn’t moving,” she explains.
Gratton says she and two other drivers followed the suspect after he left the scene, and caught up with him about a block away.
“We had the white truck cornered, and the blue truck went in to block him, and then I slid in there to stop him because it looked like he was trying to get away, but the man was pointing at him saying, ‘No, you’re going to be accountable. You hit a senior back there.'”
Gratton says she didn’t think of her own safety when she acted.
“It was how he ran. He didn’t stop and think, ‘Oh, I hit somebody. Did I hit somebody?’ He just pressed on that gas. He spun his tires so loudly. It was such a loud screech. And he just took off. He didn’t want to have any accountability.”
Troy Clayton Tessman, 35, was arrested and a number of charges are pending.
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