A 15-year-old boy who was fatally struck by a car whose driver had swerved to avoid crashing into a pair of stopped vehicles in Lancaster was identified Friday, while investigators worked to determine if the driver was impaired and the teen’s family began raising money for funeral expenses.
The teen, Adrian Smith of Lancaster, died at a hospital, according to the coroner’s office.
He was killed around 10 p.m. Thursday on Avenue L just west of 32nd Street West. The two vehicles the driver swerved to avoid were stopped to allow the rest of the boy’s family to cross the street, said Lt. Dan Nagelmann of the Lancaster Sheriff’s Station.
The family of four was crossing outside a crosswalk and the boy had gone ahead while the rest of his family members waited on a median to cross Avenue L, Nagelmann said.
The boy was standing next to a fence when he was struck, and the driver suffered moderate injuries when the vehicle rolled a few times, according to Nagelmann. The boy and the driver, a man in his 30s, were taken to hospitals, where the boy was pronounced dead, he said. No other injuries were reported.
The teen’s mother tearfully described the scene.
“And the next thing you know, this car hit another car and it just, I don’t know, it just was out of control and it just came through and it just flipped and it flipped and it flipped on my baby,” she said. “And it flipped off of my baby.”
An investigation is underway to determine if drugs or alcohol were factors in the crash, Nagelmann said.
Adrian’s family established a GoFundMe page in hopes of raising money for funeral expenses. The page is at www.gofundme.com/Adrian-smith-funeral.
—City News Service