"Driver arraigned in crash that killed Dorchester teen" by Laura Crimaldi Globe Staff May 20, 2015
Fritz Philogene, 18, had just clocked out at work at his part-time job and was headed to meet some friends on his bicycle Tuesday night as he approached a three-way intersection in Dorchester. He was a block from home, a family friend said.
But Philogene never got beyond the intersection of Talbot Avenue with Norwell Street and New England Avenue. About 10 p.m. a white Cadillac allegedly driven by a Dorchester man who has never held a valid Massachusetts driver’s license slammed into the rear of a BMW stopped at a traffic light and sent both vehicles barreling into the intersection, a prosecutor said Wednesday.
Caught in the collision was Philogene, a student at West Roxbury Academy who succumbed to his injuries at the scene despite the efforts of bystanders who tried CPR to save him. Prosecutors did not release his name pending “final confirmation” of his identity, but Christopher Graham, a family friend, said the victim was Philogene.
Gregory McCoy, 27, the driver who allegedly caused the crash, fled after the Cadillac he was driving lost its axle and one of its wheels, according to Suffolk Assistant District Attorney Gregory Henning. The vehicle came to a rest on New England Avenue, the prosecution said.
In leaving, McCoy abandoned Philogene, his passenger, who also owns the Cadillac, and the driver of the BMW, Henning said. McCoy’s passenger suffered severe compound fractures to his legs and the 33-year-old BMW driver was also injured, Henning said.
“In this case the defendant fled the scene of a motor vehicle incident where bodies were literally laying across the intersection,” Henning said at McCoy’s arraignment in the Dorchester division of the Boston Municipal Court.
He said the force of the crash knocked over a light pole.
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“The Cadillac by slamming into the rear of that BMW spun both vehicles though the intersection,” Henning said. “The teenage boy who was on or with a bicycle at that intersection was struck by the collision and his body was thrown through the intersection, slammed to the ground, coming to rest on the opposite side of Norwell Street.”
One resident said Philogene was covered with debris and another resident said some people initially did not realize a bicyclist was hurt.
“Everything happened so quick,” said Wanda Toledo, who lives near the crash site. “Everybody was screaming, ‘There’s another body there!’ That’s when we all realized there was another body there.”
McCoy was arrested about four hours later at his mother’s Dorchester home less than a mile away where officers found him asleep in his bedroom, according to a police report filed in court....
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