Man arrested in crash that killed pedestrian
James Montgomery Preston was driving to Orlando International Airport shortly after 7:30 p.m. March 8 to pick up a friend, when he called her to say he had been in a crash and had hit something, an arrest report states.
He didn’t stop to call 911 and kept driving to the airport, according to the report.
It turned out that Preston had hit Karissa Hilts, 29, of Central Square, N.Y., who ran into the southbound lanes of Florida’s Turnpike to grab a cellphone she had dropped. She died at the scene.
Preston’s friend told investigators she noticed Preston’s red Honda Odyssey van was “pretty banged up.” The airbags had gone off and glass from the broken windshield forced her to sit in the back seat, the report states.
She said Preston seemed “shaken up and not himself ” as he drove her home to Mount Dora. They passed the crash scene on their way and saw Florida Highway Patrol troopers investigating.
The friend said she urged Preston to report the crash and called investigators the next morning when she saw reports about it on the news.
Preston, 77, of Mount Dora, was arrested Sunday on a felony charge of leaving the scene of a crash involving death.
Hilts was a back-seat passenger in a black Toyota sedan heading south on the turnpike in Orlando, when she dropped her cellphone out a window..Her Two friends told troopers Hilts jumped out of the car as soon as they pulled onto the shoulder and ran into the travel lanes. Then they saw Hilts fly through the air, the report states.