A woman in Tennessee died after sustaining injuries in what police are describing as a “freak accident” after she got pinned between two cars in a parking lot.
The Murfreesboro Police Department said in a Facebook post that the woman — identified as 61-year-old Cathy Pendergrass of Warrenton, Va. — had been helping a man in a wheelchair enter a vehicle when the incident happened.
Police said the incident took place on Monday, Dec. 23 at around 3 p.m. local time in the parking lot of LongHorn Steakhouse at The Avenue Mall, and involved a Honda CRV which had been “modified for use as a mail carrier vehicle” and had an “accelerator and brake pedal installed on the passenger side.”
A preliminary investigation by police revealed that another woman had been in the driver’s seat of the Honda and “reversed out of a parking space to allow a man in a wheelchair to enter the vehicle,” while Pendergrass stood outside and “assisted” him.
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Police noted that the man “recently suffered a stroke and has no feeling on his left side,” and as he was getting into the SUV, his foot “accidentally pressed the accelerator pedal.”
“[This caused] the vehicle to reverse and spin out of control,” police said. “The SUV struck a parked vehicle, pinning the woman [Pendergrass] who was standing outside between the two vehicles.”
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Police said the “out-of-control SUV” continued to reverse and crashed into “two additional parked vehicles” before “coming to a stop.” Photos shared by the department show the blue Honda CRV being towed away and the parking lot where the incident happened being cordoned off with police tape.
Emergency responders were called to the scene, and Pendergrass was taken to Saint Thomas Rutherford Hospital in critical condition. She was later transferred to Vanderbilt Medical Center, where police said she died on Saturday, Dec. 28.
The man in the wheelchair and the woman in the driver’s seat “were not hurt,” police said.
The incident is currently under investigation by the Murfreesboro Police Department’s Fatal Accident Crash Team.
Police said the parking lot section where the incident occurred was “blocked off” after the crash, causing “long delays in the area.”
This prompted authorities to recommend that shoppers use other entrances while emergency crews investigated the scene.