Dead pedestrian, hit-skip suspect identified

A Clinton County man has been arrested by the Fayette County sheriff’s office on a felony charge of leaving the scene of an accident in which a man was killed Sunday morning.

The body of Thomas Ketcher, 44, of Washington Court House, was found Stanforth shortly after 7:30 a.m. Sunday in a ditch in front of the Heritage Memorial Church on Old Route 35 Northwest, the sheriff’s office said.

A motorist called 911 after he saw Ketcher’s body curled up in the ditch on the south side of the road.

“It looks like somebody just left him there,” the caller said.

The sheriff’s office said in a news release Monday night that Ketcher was walking along Old Route 35 northwest about 3 a.m. Sunday when he was hit by an eastbound Ford Fusion driven by Elijah Stanforth, 19, of Sabina in Clinton County, who left the scene. Detectives located the car with damage to the windshield and passenger side at a home on South Jackson Street in Sabina and determined that Stanforth was the driver at the time of the crash, the news release said.

Stanforth entered a not-guilty plea in Washington Court House Municipal Court on Monday morning and was ordered held in lieu of $10,000 bond. Stanforth posted bond and was released from the Fayette County jail Monday evening, the sheriff’s office said.

The crash remains under investigation. A dispatcher said Monday night that to the best of his knowledge the defendant Stanforth is no relation to Fayette County Sheriff Vernon P. Stanforth.