TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Polk County Deputies Release 911 Call On Fatal Hit-Run

ADVERTISEMENT

By JOSH POLTILOVE | The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 21, 2009

Polk County deputies have released a 911 call made from one of the people who found the body of a Haines City teenager this weekend.

Deputies arrested the driver who struck the teenager, as well as the driver's husband.

Rodney Clem Cummings was in the car with his wife, Candy Cummings, when the vehicle struck Samantha Hasting, sending her flying into a barbed wire fence, deputies said.

About midnight, Hasting's mother and a friend found the girl lying on top of the fence on Bradbury Road.

"Hey, I'm not touching it, but there's a piece of the car here," the 911 caller said.

"Ok, just leave it there," a dispatcher tells him during the call. "The investigators will get it, OK?"

Hasting, an 11th-grader, was a true country girl, and she loved mud bogging and country music, said
her uncle, Bill Landes. She loved her family and enjoyed camping with them. Landes said she wanted to be a nurse one day.

On Sunday, an anonymous tip led deputies to arrest Candy Cummings, 20, of Davenport. She is charged with leaving the scene of a fatal crash and driving without a valid license, the Polk County Sheriff's Office said.

She was released from Polk County Jail on Sunday afternoon after $15,500 bail was posted, jail records show, but was arrested again a few hours later after her bondsman determined she was a flight risk and revoked her bond, sheriff's office spokeswoman Carrie Eleazer said.

Rodney Cummings knew his wife did not have a valid driver's license, Eleazer said. He's charged with permitting an unauthorized operator of a motor vehicle and with violation of parole from a previous illegal dumping charge. He's being held without bail.

Eleazer said Cummings and his wife aren't being cooperative.

Deputies say Hasting left home about 6:30 p.m. Friday to walk less than a mile to her friend's house.

Hasting's mother had sent her daughter text messages at 9 p.m., but her daughter hadn't replied, the sheriff's office said. A friend also became concerned by about midnight when she realized Hasting had left to visit her hours earlier.

Based upon evidence at the scene, investigators think Hasting was walking north on Bradbury Road, south of Hinson Avenue, when she was struck from behind and thrown about 75 feet into the fence, the sheriff's office said.

Her belongings and debris from the impact were scattered for about 150 feet.

The sheriff's office received a tip about 11:45 p.m. Saturday that a car with damage to the front passenger side was in Davenport.

The sheriff's office arrest affidavit said Candy Cummings told deputies she and her husband were visiting family members Friday night in Haines City near the crash scene and left about 6:45 p.m.

She also told deputies she hit something while driving her husband's 1992 Mercury Grand Marquis north on Bradbury Road but did not report the accident because she did not have a valid license and had never possessed a driver's license, the affidavit said.

Cummings told deputies she hoped she had hit a large dog, according to the affidavit. The impact knocked off a side mirror and caved in the windshield, the affidavit said.

After the crash she drove back to her home on U.S. 92, the sheriff's office said.

Information from Tribune archives was used in this report. Reporter Josh Poltilove can be reached at (813) 259-7691.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT