Norwood accident stuns students, friends
NORWOOD — Just two days into the new high school year, the three Norwood High girls were already a giggling posse as they gathered Thursday night for a slumber party where they dashed through their homework, then styled one another’s hair while munching on popcorn.
But as they walked to school yesterday morning, authorities say a sun blinded driver hit them, killing Allison White, 14. and injuring Shawna O’Neil 14, who was treated at a local hospital and released. The third girl, 14, of Norwood. Annmarie Davies, 14, escaped injury because she trailed behind her friends; it was difficult to keep up in flip-flops.
The news rippled across Norwood High yesterday morning — and a school year began in mourning. Principal George Usevich announced the death on the school’s television network: “There was a serious accident this morning,” he began. Many classmates of White, a gregarious and popular freshman, rushed out of class in hysterics, school officials said. Others huddled in hallways. Grief counselors consoled students. Faculty and administrators mourned the loss.
The driver, Amanda Hayes of Norwood, a teacher at St. John the Evangelist School in Canton, was cited on charges of vehicular homicide, negligent driving, and failing to yield to pedestrians in a crosswalk, authorities said. She could face up to 4 1/2 years in prison and a $150 fine. Hayes will appear at a hearing in Dedham District Court later.
Norwood teen on way to school killed by car
At Hayes’s Norwood home last night, investigators assigned to the Middlesex district attorney’s office executed a search warrant and removed her computer, according to WBZ-TV. Hayes, the station reported, is under investigation for allegedly having a relationship with a 14-year-old Weston boy and sending 40 to 50 sexually explicit e-mails to the teen. The parents of the 14-year-old have taken out a restraining order against Hayes, according to WBZ-TV.
Hayes worked at a Weston school, resigning in July, Alan Oliff, superintendent of Weston public schools, confirmed. He declined to comment on the reason for her departure.
“She has no open cases with us right now, and we have no comment on pending investigations,” said Timothy St. Laurent, spokesman for Middlesex District Attorney Martha Coakley.
The accident occurred yesterday on a road where the speed limit is 30 miles per hour. Police said yesterday that they believed the sun was in Hayes’s eyes and that they were investigating whether she was speeding at the time of the collision.
Hayes’s students, wearing uniforms for the pre-K through eighth-grade Catholic school, gathered at her Norwood house to comfort her yesterday.
In the afternoon, White’s parents went to the intersection where their daughter died. When her father, Richard White, arrived, a mass of grieving teens had congregated at the site. After looking about, he comforted a weeping teenage girl. He declined to comment as he walked away.
Allison’s mother, Cynthia White, was taken to the scene in a police vehicle; she was working her job as a Norwood crossing guard, at another location, when the accident occurred.
Annmarie Davies also returned, wearing the same pink flip-flops that probably saved her life. She, too, declined to comment, and friends huddled around her.
Last night, through a spokesman, Hayes and her extended family issued a statement expressing their “deepest sympathy” to the White family. “No words can heal the hearts nor ease the pain of the loss of a child. [Yesterday’s] tragedy has forever altered the lives of both the White and the Hayes families, and we express our deepest condolences,” the statement said. “Mrs. Hayes is the mother of two and an educator, and her entire family prays for the White family in this horrific time of grief and unbearable loss.”
The accident occurred on a clear and sunny morning at the intersection of a busy Norwood commuter thoroughfare and a residential street. The three girls walked up the residential street, Bruce Road, from the Davies’s house, which took them to the crossing at Chapel Street. The pedestrian crosswalk on Chapel was marked with white paint, and a yellow “Go Slow Children” sign warned Chapel Street drivers about 20 yards from the intersection.
There is no stop sign at the intersection, but Norwood authorities yesterday said the accident would probably spur the town to put one there.
White’s classmates gathered at the intersection yesterday afternoon, bearing flowers and hugging one another. Many wrote “RIP AW 143” on their arms, using the numerical Internet messaging code for “I love you.”
As she stared at the accident site, Jenn Cobb, 15, said: “Everything about her is wonderful. She’s a sweetie.”
Cobb recalled hugging White just the day before. “I told her she looked cute, because she did,” she said. Jim Forrest, Norwood High’s freshman dean of students and White’s health teacher in middle school, recalled her magnetism.
“She was a really popular kid. A beautiful girl, with a bright smile, full of energy. Other kids wanted to be around her,” he said. “Its the smile that I see right now.”
Some parents and residents suggested the intersection of Chapel Street and Bruce Road was an accident waiting to happen.
“It’s a really busy intersection … it should really have a four-way stop sign,” said Dunkin MacEachern, who lives near the crash site.
Richard J. Davies, the father of the uninjured girl in the accident, said a flashing stop light with pedestrian controls was needed at the intersection. Still, he counted himself lucky. “It could have been her,” he said of his daughter.
But concerns about the intersection had not reached the ears of one public official. “Never heard a comment about it,” said Norwood’s general manager, John Carroll, who would approve any changes at the intersection.
A Norwood police spokesman, Officer Paul Bishop, said he could not recall any serious accidents there in the past decade. Of adding a stop sign to the intersection, he said, “There’s probably a good chance of that happening because of the incident today.”
On Thursday, White, a soccer player and dancer, spent the night at the Davies’s house with her two new friends, Davies and O’Neil. The three did homework. They did one another’s hair. They ate beef Stroganoff. And the next morning, instead of the usual car ride, they opted to walk to school on a clear, fall-like morning.
About 7:30 a.m., with the sun shining into the eyes of eastbound drivers on Chapel Street, Hayes struck White and O’Neil as they crossed Chapel, police said.
“Basically, she didn’t see the girl,” Bishop said of Hayes. “The first time when she knew the girl was there was when she was on her windshield.”
The view both ways on Chapel Street is straight and unobstructed; pedestrians crossing can easily see far-off traffic. State law requires drivers to yield to pedestrians in marked crosswalks.
A neighbor, Patricia McGovern, rushed to the scene, at first fearing it was her own daughter, who also a freshman. She held White’s limp hand as she lay in the street. White was flown by helicopter to Massachusetts General Hospital, where doctors pronounced her dead of head and spinal trauma at 8:39 a.m. O’Neil, with a leg injury, and Hayes, who was emotionally upset, were taken to Norwood Hospital and released within hours.
Some students had passed the scene on the way to school. Rumors flew through the halls. A grief-counseling team consisting of teachers, counselors, nurses, and clergy made themselves available to students. Many students, with parental permission, left for the day.
And the first Friday of the school year became the saddest day at Norwood High in memory.
The Rev. Christopher Coyne, spokesman for the Archdiocese of Boston, which employs Hayes, said: “Everyone will try to support her as we need to… We’re also offering our prayers for the little girl that died, that was killed.”
Jenn Abelson of the Globe staff contributed to this story.
By Raja Mishra and John Ellement
GLOBE STAFF
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