Again, an innocent human being — this time a 7-year-old boy — has died — lost a lifetime — due to momentary driver distractions or inattentiveness.

In this case the boy, Cameron Dumore, was walking to school in Lithonia, GA. He was crossing the street within a crosswalk. A crossing guard was present, waving a handheld stop sign and alerting vehicles to stop. And they were, of course, in a school zone.

No matter. Despite all these things, an SUV driven by a 40-year-old woman disregarded the cross walk, the school zone, the crossing guard, the handheld stop sign and every other indicator to stop — including the boy himself — and, without slowing down, struck the boy and killed him.

It’s still unclear why she didn’t stop until it was too late. We don’t know if she was making a cell phone call or a text message. We don’t know if she was diverted by her own child in her car. We do know that she wasn’t paying enough attention to stop for a child in a clearly marked school crosswalk which was patrolled by a crossing guard while every other vehicle did, in fact, stop.

As a result, the driver faces charges of vehicular manslaughter and failure to yield to a child in a crosswalk. She also could be sued for wrongful death by the boy’s family. And regardless of what legal or financial price she pays, she will have to live with her car accident failure for the rest of her life.

For all of us, it’s yet another wake-up call to give our full attention — not just the narrow portion of it we share while multi-tasking — to driving while behind the wheel of a car or other vehicle.

As was painfully shown to this woman and the boy’s family, driving is serious business. Driving, in fact, is life or death. And unless your phone call, makeup application or fast food eating is a life or death matter, you should put them on hold until you reach your destination. Yet cell phone accident and texting accident tragedies are mushrooming in America, prompting many states to enact legislation in the absence of drivers’ common sense.

Meanwhile, if you or a loved one has suffered in a car accident or auto accident due to another driver’s negligence, let a car accident lawyer from Jim S. Adler & Associates fight for your legal rights. Call 1-800-505-1414 today, or submit the free case review form on this page. Also remember that an auto accident attorney dramatizes for others that, while yielding to distractions is not a crime in itself, the tragedies that can ensue are serious indeed.

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