Hit-and-run victim still hopes PBSO finds driver
Man suffered serious injuries when thrown from motorcycle.
LAKE WORTH — Antonio Delpino is still recovering from fracturing his face, an eye socket and his jaw nearly two months ago, when he was thrown from his motorcycle in a hit-and-run crash in Lake Worth.
However, last Tuesday, the 35-year-old Greenacres-area man found hope in the fact that Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office investigators said they may have found the truck involved with the May 9 crash.
The vehicle deputies say hit Delpino — a 2005 Ford F-150 — was found June 30 and seized as evidence, a sheriff ’s office report said. It did not disclose where the vehicle was found.
Delpino said finding the vehi- cle was “the first piece of the puzzle” needed to locate the person who hit and left him lying unconscious in evening rushhour traffic.
“If he did this to me, he could do it to anybody,” Delpino said. “This person shouldn’t be allowed to be in our communities without any repercussions.”
Authorities have said the next steps in a hit-and-run investigation are difficult: proving who was driving and that he or she knew a crash had taken place. Delpino says he is optimistic that the person who hit him will be held responsible.
Deputies said in their report that criminal charges are pending, but no arrests had been made as of early last week in the crash, which took place just after 6:30 p.m. May 9 at Sixth Avenue South and South F Street.
A sheriff ’s report said the pickup driver failed to yield to right-of-way traffic at the intersection’s stop sign.
Security-camera footage Delpino’s lawyer obtained from a business near the crash site shows the scene unfold. It also shows Delpino lying in the street as cars drive around his body and bystanders rush to his aid.
Delpino, who works in auto services, understands that accidents happen. What he said he can’t understand is how the driver of the truck just drove away.
“How does this guy sleep every day knowing that he maybe killed me?” he said. “Actually, he doesn’t know. He didn’t stop. He doesn’t know whether I’m alive or dead.”
Delpino says his days riding motorcycles are over.
“I don’t want to hang it up. I love motorcycles,” he said. “But my wife’s 35 weeks pregnant. I don’t even want to take the chance that it could happen again. It’s not worth it with a kid on the way.”
Anyone with information can contact the sheriff ’s office at 561-688-3000 or Crime Stoppers of Palm Beach County at 800-458TIPS (8477). Callers to Crime Stoppers can be anonymous.