A 20-year-old man, driving under the influence and at excessive speed early yesterday evening along New York Drive, died after clipping another car. Buddy Allen was dead at the scene of the accident. Apparently, he was not strapped into his seat belt at the time he collided with a car in front of him.
Allen was doing about 60 mph on the 35 mph street when his SUV overtook and hit a car driven by Steve Frohman. Frohman, a scratch golfer, had just finished an unpleasant round of golf. He said he was doing the speed limit when he happened to look in his rear view mirror and saw a car coming up on him fast.
Certain that he was about to get rear-ended, Frohman managed to get halfway into the adjoining lane. The speeding car hit Frohman’s new sedan, then hit a curb, and became airborne. Allen flew out of the car, landing on grass near the base of a light pole. Frohman, braking to a stop, saw Allen land on the grass. But the unthinkable happened. Upside down but also flying through the air, the SUV struck the light pole and dropped straight down, landing squarely on Allen.
Frohman ran over to the SUV. Seeing both of Allen’s feet under the SUV, Frohman tried to rock it back and forth so that it would roll off Allen. Not succeeding, he dialed 911 on his cell phone. Police and paramedics arrived within a few minutes. Frohman was still trying to roll the SUV off the victim when they arrived. The police told him to move back. Four of them rolled the SUV off the dead body. The paramedics did not even check the airway; they knew a dead person when they saw one.
One of the police officers congratulated Frohman on his attempt to save Allen.
“I wasn’t trying to save him,” said Frohman. “I was planning to knock his teeth out for damaging my car.”