Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
Draper police are looking for a female driver who hit a crossing guard then sped off. The man who got hit is recovering from broken ribs.
It happened on Tuesday around 4 p.m. across the street from Willow Springs Elementary, located at 13288 Lone Rock Dr.
Kent Woodward thought he was going to start packing up after he had walked the last student across the street.
"I was going in the middle with the stop sign; you hold it up and go in the middle. Then as I turned to go back across the street, she got me with her mirror," he said.
Woodward, a retired airman, was spun around and dazed. He tried to get a license plate number, but all he could make out was a female driver on her cell phone in a black Escalade. Woodward says she sped off.
Sgt. Ron Jackson of the Draper City Police Department said, "I would assume it's someone who has a child that goes to the school or a school in that area or who may live in that area or use that roadway to go to and from work."
Police say Woodward had turned on crosswalk lights and had put out bright cones. They also say the driver most likely felt the impact.
Woodward is just thankful that last student wasn't in the street.
"If that would have hit his head, it probably would have killed him," Woodward said. "I think my body kind of saved this little boy's life. Instead of him getting hit, my body got hit."
A neighbor who knows Woodward, Joseph Milton Smith, says motorists blow by this area all the time.
"Since Draper became a city, it's a freeway almost. People go pretty fast through here," he said.
Police say the woman was probably distracted because she was talking on her cell phone. And even though this could happen again, Woodward says the danger won't keep him away.
"I'll probably go back to that same school because I know the kids so well and the parents, and the whole neighborhood is so great. I definitely will go back," he said.
Woodward did not report the incident until the day after it happened. Officers say they have no witnesses, so they'd like to hear from anyone with information in the case.
E-mail: tcallan@ksl.com
E-mail: ngonzales @ksl.com
