Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Brother of hit-and-run victim hopes surveillance video will help find driver
FORT LAUDERDALE — Allen Trowbridge was almost home.
He was heading back to his apartment in Fort Lauderdale after a few hours of bike riding early Friday morning. Before he made it home, the driver of a gray Ford F150 hit him on North Federal Highway and drove away.
His brother Stephen Trowbridge is hoping Fort Lauderdale Police find the two people who were seen on a nearby business’s surveillance video getting out of the truck, assessing the damage and taking off.
Shortly after 3:40 a.m. Friday, police and Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue went to the 2900 block of North Federal Highway. Trowbridge, 57, of Fort Lauderdale, was pronounced dead, police said.
The surveillance video released Wednesday shows the truck pulling into an empty parking lot. Then a man and woman get out of the truck about 3:34 a.m., walk around and pause to look at the damage before they get back inside and drive off a few minutes later. Stephen Trowbridge said the two pulled over about two miles away from where his brother was hit.
“They just casually get back in the car and drive away. They know they hit somebody … You don’t hit somebody on a bicycle and not know it,” he said.
Trowbridge left his home on the bike about midnight Friday to get out of the house, his roommates told Stephen Trowbridge. Without a car or television, his bike was his source of entertainment, his brother said, so he rode for a few hours, stopped downtown and headed back.
Stephen Trowbridge worked at a trauma center in Delray Beach for nearly two decades before he moved to Tennessee. He witnessed the aftermath of hit-and-run crashes, pedestrians who were struck by cars and bicyclists who didn’t survive.
“You hope and pray it never happens to a family member,” he said.
Trowbridge had turned 57 just a few weeks before the crash. Originally from Massachusetts, he moved to Fort Lauderdale after he earned two bachelor’s degrees from Boston College. He went on to work for the Tri-County Animal Rescue and was proud of his efforts in saving stranded animals after hurricanes, his brother said.
“Most of all he just had a huge heart. He was a kind soul. I don’t think he ever tried to hurt anybody his whole life,” Stephen Trowbridge said. “I think if he would be remembered for anything, he’d want to be remembered for that — his love for animals.”
Stephen Trowbridge’s son graduated from Florida State University on Saturday. He was planning to take a vacation with his son when he learned Sunday that his younger brother was killed. He’s planning the funeral instead.
The thought of someone capable of driving off, without attempting to help, after hitting another person is hard for Stephen Trowbridge to imagine.
“I just think it’s a horrible person or people that would hit somebody with their vehicle and leave them there to die and not even call for help or stop, nothing. Just hit somebody hard enough to kill them almost instantly,” he said. “So he was hit hard, hard enough for lots of injuries that took his life. There’s just no excuse for somebody doing that.”
Police are still searching for the driver and passenger inside the gray, newer model Ford F150 from 2018 to 2022 that has damage to its front passenger side.
Stephen Trowbridge hopes someone will recognize the couple or the truck in the surveillance video.
“Not that anything can bring him back,” he said, “but get them off the road and don’t let them do it to anybody else.”