My friend was killed at 24 walking across a crosswalk when he had a walk signal. A driver made a left turn and struck him and he died in surgery that day in the hospital. His girlfriend is a longtime friend of mine and roommate and was destroyed. I was the one that called the hospital and got a worker to break hippa and confirm he died, and had to tell her. Then my girlfriend and I drove her 4 hours back home from our apartment.

I followed the case for a bit but stopped before he was sentenced because I wanted to move on. I looked up his name a few minutes ago and found an article detailing that the driver, who stayed on the scene, was charged with a misdemeanor for failing to exercise due care and fined $250. Didn’t lose his license, no jail time.

I can’t tell his girlfriend because I can’t give her another reason to hate and relive this whole thing but I’m sitting across from her watching TV and this feels horrible.