Right now a body lays on the street in front of my apartment complex. It’s a bloody mess. He was probably run over by a car, but not by accident. Here’s why I know that:
I was driving home tonight as normal when a speeding truck came up from behind me, swerved and hit the car in front of me. I realized this was no accident when I saw the truck continue to follow the car it hit back and forth across the street. Finally they pulled into a parking lot and stopped. I followed at a safe distance (but stayed on the street) and began to call 911.
Two hispanic guys with their shirts off got out of the truck and began beating the windows of the car and trying to open the doors. Suddenly they were running with the car as it attempted to drive away again. I had to turn around but the white car got back onto the road and sped away. By this time I was trying to avoid being seen because I didn’t want to get involved. I drove back down the street and saw a man running on the sidewalk. He had no shirt on either. I didn’t know where he came from but he looked like he was involved. Then I saw it… a body in the street. Bloody. It was right in front of my driveway to my apartment. So I stopped pursuing the white car and parked my jeep. (The white car ended up stopping a few hundred feet up the road, and there was blood streaks indicating this guy was ran over and dragged).
I got my CPR mask and gloves that I always keep in the glove box. Memories of the last accident I helped at flashed through my mind, but this time was different: I knew somebody was hurt bad. This time the scene was graphic… (don’t read it if you are sensitive to blood)
He was on his back, arms and legs spread out and painted in blood. No shirt but a pair of jeans and a cell phone a few inches from his body. A large open wound was on his right shoulder. The back of his head was popped open and his scalp was separated from his skull. There was a pile of thick clotted blood under his head and in his mouth. Some of it ran into the gutter but the blood around his head was thick and pasty. I put on my gloves and checked the scene. Someone was checking his pulse and said he could feel it fading. I checked his wrist and neck and felt no pulse. Also checked for breathing and got nothing. I checked his airway and pulled out clots of blood and some dirt. I put the mask over his mouth and began a chest compression. It was just too bloody. The blood was thick like paint and just squished under the mask. More came out his mouth and nose. He was gone. I stopped. Paramedics showed up.
As a witness to the “homicide” I had to stay and wait. There were other witnesses too but I saw most of it from the beginning to the end. While waiting I overheard one of the officers say they had someone (the guy I saw on foot) in custody and were pursuing others. They wouldn’t tell me anything else. I was really curious to know how many people were involved, and especially WHY were those guys in the truck mad at the guys in the white car. I wish I was a detective. I just had to sit there and wait. Three hours went by. I got to watch them map out the scene and do a lot of writing. I wrote up a report of what I saw, then I finally got to tell a detective. Then they let me go home.
Now here I am. It’s past two in the morning. I hope I can sleep tonight. It’s the Fourth of July, and all I can think about is that this guy just died tonight. His life, over. And he didn’t even know it was going to end like this. And now his family will mourn. Plus, the graphic scenes in my head, and my curiosities as to what happened… I didn’t see how he got there! Was he one of the guys from the truck that tried to hang onto the white car as it sped away? or was he already in the street when the car hit him? I didn’t see so I don’t know.
