Man, 75, charged after boy, 8, on bike crashes into van in Plain Township
PLAIN TWP. ‒ An 8-year-old on a bike was seriously injured Monday when he collided with a van while riding at Bretton Street and Norriton Circle NW.
A 75-year-old man who lives half a mile away has been charged with failing to stop after an accident on a public road, a fourth-degree felony.
Stark County Sheriff George T. Maier said the collision was reported at 10:10 a.m. Monday. He said the boy, who was northbound on Norriton, failed to obey a stop sign at the Bretton intersection and hit the passenger side of the eastbound van, a white 2022 Chevrolet Express owned by the Stark County Educational Service Center.
Maier said the driver said he believed he had hit an unoccupied bike the street. The driver left and was later found at his home by a sergeant with the sheriff's office following an investigation involving multiple deputies.
A complaint filed in Canton Municipal Court said the defendant "knowingly was involved in an accident involving a child on a mountain bike in the roadway. The defendant failed to render any aid or acknowledgement of the accident. Instead the defendant fled from the scene of the crash and returned home where he took purposeful actions to conceal and remove any evidence from the vehicle he was operating. The victim, 8 years of age, was rushed to the hospital in critical condition."
Plain Township Fire Chief Chuck Shalenberger said the boy was taken to Akron Children's Hospital. He said his agency was called to the scene and responded quickly from Station No. 4, located 2.7 miles away on Market Avenue.
Neighbor Daniel Holdsworth said the impact of the collision knocked the victim's shoes off his feet. He said the child was initially unconscious, but started to wake up and try to move when he was being put into the ambulance.
"It was horrific," he said. "They're very lucky the child wasn't killed."
Holdsworth ran from door to door in the neighborhood until he found the boy's mother. After locating her, he was among the neighbors who tended to the victim before paramedics arrived.
He said residents have been concerned about traffic in the area.
"That street that it happened on, we've complained for years about speeding because it's just like a dragstrip," Holdsworth said. "People just go all the way through it. They use it to get to Mount Pleasant (Street), as a cut-through, and there's families and people walking with dogs and kids and strollers. It's all neighborhoods in that area. It's a recipe for disaster. They need to get some stop signs or something done because someone's going to die."
Maier said the crash remains under investigation.
The van driver was not injured.
A status conference on the case is scheduled for Friday in municipal court.
Reach Nancy at 330-580-8382 or nancy.molnar@cantonrep.com.
On X, formerly known as Twitter: @nmolnarTR
This article originally appeared on The Repository: Boy, 8, hurt in hit-skip crash while riding bike in Plain Township
