WARREN — The woman struck and killed by an SUV early Sunday on Youngstown Road S.E. was pushing a broken-down pickup truck her father was driving when she was hit, police said. Police have identified the victim as Sally Miller, 53, of Niles.
The accident occurred at 3:40 a.m. just east of the Edgehill Avenue S.E. intersection when Miller got out of her father’s GMC Sierra pickup to push after it broke down, police said. She was struck by a GMC Envoy driven by Jane A. Penny, 29, also of Niles.
According to a statement given by Miller’s father, 73-year-old Loren Wingard of Warren, he was driving east on Youngstown Road in the right lane close to the entrance of Crest Lanes when his truck’s engine died. He said he stopped for a few minutes before deciding to put the truck in neutral and have it coast backward until he could gain enough speed to back it into the parking lot of AHEPA.
Wingard said he was able to get most of his truck backed into the lot except the front end, which still was on the road.
He said he asked his daughter to push the truck back into the street to get it to roll down the hill so he could pull into another lot, the police report states.
Miller pushed his truck onto the roadway but it got stuck with its nose close to the double yellow line, stretching across both eastbound lanes, he told police. Wingard said he and his daughter saw a car coming toward them in the curbside lane and Miller ran to the front of the unlighted truck and began waving at the oncoming car, Wingard said.
The oncoming car swerved to the left at the last minute and he tried getting to the center seat to prepare for a collision, he said. The Envoy hit his truck and he looked up and saw it on the other side of the road, with Miller lying on the curb behind the Envoy, he said.
Wingard said he didn’t hear any screeching tires and he had his hazard lights on, but they may have been hard to see because of the angle of his truck. He said his daughter didn’t yell at the oncoming car, but waved her hands at it.
Penny said she was going home from a friend’s house when the accident occurred. She said she was traveling about 40 mph and grabbed her water, and the next thing she saw was a red truck coming out of the bowling alley with a lady in front of it.
Penny said she swerved to miss it, but it came out with no lights on and couldn’t be seen, according to her statement to police.
Miller was pronounced dead at St. Joseph Health Center.
Police said the accident still is under investigation, but no charges are expected to be filed.
mkosinski@tribune-chronicle.com
