BOY KILLED BY CAR WAS CHASING SOCCER BALL
Agency’s report differs from account given by family friend.
LANTANA — An 8-year-old boy struck and killed by a car last week on Lantana Road was chasing a soccer ball across the busy roadway when he was hit, according to a report from the Florida Department of Children and Families.
LeAndre Jeremiah Desronvil, a third-grader at Palm Beach Maritime Academy, was killed instantly Nov. 15 when he was struck by a 2017 Chevrolet Colorado as he attempted to cross three eastbound lanes to the south side of the roadway.
A family friend said last week that LeAndre was hit while playing a game of “chicken” with oncoming traffic, probably at the behest of older children he was with. According to PBSO, the children accompanying LeAndre fled the area after the crash.
The friend, who asked that she be identified as Ivy Amor and said she helped raise LeAndre, did not witness the crash but said she spoke to the boy’s 12-yearold sister immediately after the incident. The 12-year-old sister as well as another older sibling were with LeAndre when the crash took place.
But the DCF report makes no mention of the child, or the children he was with, playing the dangerous game.
Instead, the report states that LeAndre was playing soccer near his home on Lantana Road just east of Congress Avenue, with other children including his siblings when the ball rolled onto the roadway.
LeAndre, referred to as Jeremiah in the report, and the other children ran to the roadway’s median. LeAndre attempted to run back to the south side of the street on his own and made it to the middle lane when he was hit. The crash took place at 6:19 p.m.
Lantana Road is a six-lane roadway with a posted speed limit of 45 mph, although vehicles are typically seen going much faster.
The report said that the driver of the Chevrolet, Joseph Ingrassia of Deerfield Beach, had no way of stopping in time.
Ingrassia is not facing charges, a Palm Beach County Sheriff ’s Office spokeswoman said last week.
Amor, the family friend, could not be reached for comment on Tuesday. Attempts to contact LeAndre’s parents have been unsuccessful.
DCF chose to investigate the death after receiving an abuse report on its hotline Nov. 16 alleging that LeAndre was struck while running across the street without adult supervision.
Parts of the DCF report are
blacked out, including the nature of two prior contacts between the agency and LeAndre’s family in 2008 and 2011. A sentence in the narrative describing the events leading up to LeAndre being hit by the Chevrolet is also redacted from the report.
DCF doesn’t investigate every child death. The department only looks into deaths suspected to be the result of caregiver abuse, neglect or abandonment that are called into the Florida Abuse Hotline, a department spokeswoman said.