Renewed calls for safety upgrades after 3 children hit at crosswalk

FORT WORTH, Texas - Police have identified a possible suspect for the recent hit-and-run accident that injured a 16-year-old boy at a crosswalk in Fort Worth.

The driver's name has not been released, and the driver is not in custody. But now, there are renewed calls for safety improvements in the area near Timber Creek High School where two other children were also hit by cars.

The four-lane road has a 40 mile per hour speed limit. There’s even a sign that warns drivers that it is state law to yield pedestrians to the crosswalk. Despite the warning and flashing lights, people continue to get hit there. And one victim has had enough.

16-year-old Hannah Perkins was nervous the first time she returned to the intersection of Alta Vista Drive and Funnel Street in far north Fort Worth since being run over by a pickup truck while riding her bike on the crosswalk in October of 2015.

“I’m shaking a little bit,” she said. “I don’t see many cars slowing down.”

It's the same area near where a 13-year old boy was hit and injured in December 2014, and parents lobbied for and got the city to add some flashing lights and signs.

Now, Hannah says she's facing her fears in order to advocate for another boy she's never met but can absolutely relate to.

“I want him to know that I am there for him and his family,” she said.

16-year-old Aaron Lancaster was run over by a hit-and-run driver at this same intersection on March 19. Hannah saw it on the news.

“She’s like, ‘Mom, there's a boy in a coma. He was hit at the same intersection,’” said Hannah’s mom, Kathy. “And I grabbed her phone and looked, and we both just broke down.”

Witnesses told police they saw Aaron push the button to activate the flashing pedestrian crossing lights and then enter the crosswalk when a car hit him and kept on going.

“Just to think that another boy was lying in that road, and it was at night, and I don’t know how long he was by himself,” Kathy said. “Somebody hit him and drove away, that’s just so much worse. And I didn’t think it could get worse then what happened to Hannah.

But, it did. And while Aaron lies in a coma unable to speak for himself, Hannah is writing, what she calls, a letter from the heart to call for the city to install a traffic light before somebody dies there.

“I’ll write it good enough in the sense that I’ll be able to bring it to the city, share it with them and hopefully move them,” she said.

Hannah hopes to have the letter complete within the next week or so. She plans to deliver a copy to the city manager and read it aloud at a future city council meeting.