On their way home from a baby shower on Saturday night, three pedestrians were hit and killed by an alleged drunk driver. NBC News reports that 40-year-old Anthony Lewis Sanchez is the suspect in the case. He was arrested shortly after the accident for felony DUI and vehicular manslaughter. The victims in this latest incident were three women in the same family: a mother, her 21-year-old daughter and 21-year-old niece.
Though drunk-driving accidents and fatalities have decreased over recent years due to harsh penalties and aggressive publicity about the problem, pedestrian accidents throughout southern California continue to rise despite increased attention paid by local authorities. One of the reasons may be that southern California does not have adequate pedestrian infrastructure throughout its urban centers.
After this most recent crash, a witness lamented that the nearest crosswalk from the incident was more than two blacks away. As the urban region of southern California continues to grow, the pedestrian problem will have to be accounted for. More crosswalks, more lighting, more traffic foot bridges over busy streets, and more public awareness of the problem: perhaps with all of that effort, the types of incidents that occurred last Saturday night will become rare rather than routine.
