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Kalamazoo: Pickup Truck Driver Plows Into Group Of Cyclists Killing Five and Injuring Four

By Anne Sewell
Published on: 22:16 PST, Jun 7, 2016

Kalamazoo is grieving for a second time this year after a pickup truck driver hit a group of cyclists Tuesday night, killing five and seriously injuring four others.

According to Kalamazoo County Prosecuting Attorney Jeffrey Getting, a fun group bicycle ride turned to tragedy after the riders were hit by a blue Chevrolet pickup truck while cycling on the road shoulder in the 5500 block of North Westnedge Avenue.

The unnamed driver was a 50-year-old man from western Michigan, who was found a short distance away from the crash site by police and is now in custody. According to Getting, once the police reports are completed, charges will be filed against the man.

The driver of the pickup truck had reportedly been driving erratically for some time prior to the incident with the cyclists, and three separate police agencies received phone calls about his driving.

The calls reportedly came in at 6:08 p.m. ET, 6:13 p.m. ET and 6:21 p.m. ET and Getting said officers with the Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety, the Kalamazoo Township Police Department and the Kalamazoo County Sheriff’s Office had been looking for the pickup truck that was driving in such a manner as to trigger calls from concerned citizens to each of the departments.

According to Getting, it was around 15 minutes later that the first reports of the crash incident came in.

According to a report by CNN, when asked if he had ever before seen anything like the mass loss of lives that occurred Tuesday in Kalamazoo, Getting then reportedly became emotional and after a pause, went on to speak about the previous tragedy in the Kalamazoo community.

The incident he referred to was that of Uber driver Jason Dalton, who went on a deadly rampage in February, allegedly killing six people and injuring two others.

“I’m at a loss to describe the impact to the community from these incidents,” Getting said. “I have every confidence in Kalamazoo and I know how the community will respond to this.”

Getting added, “I just wish we had more of an opportunity to get our feet under us before we had to do it again.”

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While Getting is concerned about the health of the injured survivors in the incident at this point, he reportedly would not elaborate on the severity of the injuries to the four cyclists.

As reported by Michigan Live, Getting later told a reporter, “This is just a unique community. The people of Kalamazoo and what we have here from the university (Western Michigan University) to the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, to the Civic Theater, to its fantastic employers. For so many people in the community, to participate in this, Kalamazoo is a unique place. We have great, great citizens.”

Getting continued by saying that he was not surprised on Tuesday night to hear that Kalamazoo Strong, a group started by residents in the area to support families of the February 20 shooting and to boost the community in its grief, has already begun efforts to support the latest victims of Tuesday evening’s tragedy.

As to the identities of the victims, authorities are still in the process of identifying the bicycle riders and notifying their relatives and will not release any names until that process is complete. However, some media reports are saying there were children among the victims.

[Photo via Flickr by Tomas Aleksiejunas, cropped and resized/CC BY 2.0]

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