BY LARA BECKER
The Cincinnati Enquirer
On the sunny streets of his Bond Hill neighborhood, Demarco Penny, 11, learned how to play tag, ride a bike, make friends.
Steve Edwards of the Cincinnati Police Traffic Section checks the truck that hit Demarco Penny, 11, Monday.
(Glenn Hartong photo)
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But while playing on those familiar streets Monday afternoon, he forgot a cardinal rule: Look both ways.
He didn't see the 1985 Ford truck coming toward him on Laidlaw Avenue. He kept running.
"I just saw the boy come out of the bushes and tried to dodge him," said Bill Williams, 64, of Northside. "When he ran across, I jammed on my brakes and cut into the other lane. He hit the right corner of my truck."
The boy lay without moving on the hot concrete in front of his best friend's house.
"I heard a car slam on its brakes, the squeak, and my cousin told me, "Demarco got hit!' " said Kevin Hall, 13. "We saw him lying in the street. I was just hoping he'd be all right, and the ambulance would hurry up and take him to the hospital."
Demarco was taken to Children's Hospital, said Sgt. Rudy Gruenke of the Cincinnati Police Division Traffic Section. He was in the intensive care unit in critical condition Monday night.
Mr. Williams, who has a weak heart after a heart attack about 10 years ago, was taken to Providence Hospital and later released. "My heart started to beat real fast," he said. "I was just upset. Seeing that boy lying there, that's what really hurt me." Thoughts of his own children and his 12 grandchildren raced through his dazed head.
"That's all I could see, my 12 grandchildren," he said.
Said his fiancee, Connie Young, 36: "That's what was going through my mind: my children, his children, other children." She had been following him on their way home from an auto-repair shop.
Mr. Williams, a retired stonemason who used to haul materials in the old Ford, had purposely avoided the expressway. The truck was still "acting up."
Hours later, the only evidence of the accident at Laidlaw and Corinth avenues were skid marks and bright pink paint outlining the scene.
But a wave of deep concern still undulated throughout the community Monday night, where neighbors congregated on porches and kids talked in hushed tones.
Although speed wasn't a factor in Monday's accident, parents say they're worried about vehicles traveling too fast.
"I've seen cars fly up the street," said Tasha Dunnaway, 27, a mother of 5-year-old girl and an 11-year-old boy.
The speed limit is 35 mph. "That's pretty fast. That's the kind of speed limit that would be on a main street, like Paddock Road," she said.
