The driver who struck and killed 63-year-old Leroy Torrence in Englewood last Satuday night has been charged with aggravated DUI.
A bond hearing was held Tuesday for the driver, 21-year-old Deshonnette Morrison. Prosecutors at the hearing said that around 11:45 p.m., Torrence and another person left a store near 71st and Ashland and attempted to cross the 7100 block of South Ashland mid-block, DNAinfo reported.
Video footage shows that Morrison was driving south on Ashland, switched lanes without signaling, and had passed several other cars on the left when she struck Torrence with the passenger side of her vehicle, according to prosecutors. The victim flew was thrown into the air. He was rushed to Advocate Christ Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 12:22 p.m. According to the Cook County medical examiner's office, he lived on the 9000 block of South Lowe.
Morrison, of the 6900 block of South Bell, stayed at the scene and told responding officers she had been drinking earlier that evening. She was found to have had a blood alcohol level of 0.105, above the legal limit of 0.08, and was charged with one felony count of aggravated DUI causing death and one misdemeanor count of DUI.
At Tuesday’s hearing, Morrison’s public defender said she works transporting senior citizens. the driver is being held in lieu of $450,000 bail, the Chicago Tribune reported.
Torrence was one of two men who were struck and killed while walking last weekend. On Sunday at 1:30 a.m. a hit-and-run driver fatally struck Eric Judge, 23, as he crossed the 2000 block of West Division in Wicker Park.
Fatality Tracker: 2017 Chicago pedestrian and bicyclist deaths
Pedestrian: 14 (five were hit-and-run crashes)
Bicyclist: 2
Note: Streetsblog Chicago’s fatality numbers are based on media reports. According to fatality numbers released at a recent Mayor’s Pedestrian Advisory Council meeting, there had been 14 pedestrian deaths in Chicago this year as of April 30. Torrence’s death is was the fifth media-reported pedestrian fatality since that date, which means that a total of at least 19 people have been fatally struck while on foot in Chicago this year.
