HURRICANE, Utah — A man is facing charges after he allegedly hit and killed a woman who was crossing the street in Hurricane last month.
68-year-old Wayne Allan Levitz was arrested on Monday and faces charges of negligent homicide.
On May 5, 66-year-old Tammy Lynn Crouse was crossing State Street at 700 West when she was hit by a Dodge Ram 5500 commercial truck. Hurricane Police said she was using the crosswalk, and the truck was turning left from 700 West onto State Street.
Crouse was unconscious and in critical condition when she was taken to the hospital. She later died from her injuries.
According to court documents, Levitz was interviewed at the scene of the crash and agreed to do a blood draw for the investigation. Investigators add that he also agreed to have his phone's data dumped.
Officers also spoke to witnesses, including one who was allegedly directly behind Levitz, who stated that they saw the victim walking across the crosswalk and knew that she was about to be struck.
Video footage was also collected from both an uninvolved car and two nearby businesses. In the footage, police say, the victim can be seen walking across State Street and being halfway across before being struck.
When detectives reviewed information from Levitz's phone, they say they found that his phone had been unlocked at 12:52 p.m., and received an incoming phone call shortly before he struck the victim.
Officers spoke to Levitz again, and he continued to deny using his phone prior to the crash. However, he did say that sometimes he would listen to a podcast while working but that he stopped it prior to driving.
Investigators claim that phone data shows that the podcast started prior to the crash and stopped 1 second after Levitz began to call 9-1-1.
Levitz was arrested in Hurricane on Monday and charged with negligent homicide.
