CENTRE COUNTY, Pa. (WTAJ) — Charges have been filed in relation to a hit and run in Penn Township that happened in April and left one person dead.
Christopher Hort, 53, is facing a felony charge of accidents involving death or personal injury.
On April 17, John David King, 23, was killed in a hit and run incident along State Route 45 in Penn Township.
King, who is Amish, was on a non-motorized scooter when the accident happened at 8:36 p.m., according to police.
King was wearing a reflective safety vest at the time of the incident and surveillance video from Burkholders Store confirmed that he was wearing reflective clothing prior to the crash.
The Centre County Deputy Coroner ruled the cause of death as blunt force trauma to the head.
Less than a week later, police said they located Hort’s vehicle, a Holda Pilot. According to police, the vehicle had damage on its right-front passenger side and fled westbound on Route 45.
Hort told police that he was traveling by himself after fishing in the areas of Elk Creek and Pine Creek and thought he might have hit a deer. Hort said he didn’t want to stop because he was afraid he would get a flat tire, noting that his hood buckled and his windshield was smashed.
Police said that in a search warrant, they found that Hort’s vehicle had deer hair in the passenger headlights but none in the grille or undercarriage, and that it looked like part of the vehicle’s exterior was wiped clean.
Police also said that paint consistent with the paint from King’s scooter was found underneath the vehicle and that injuries to the victim are consistent with the damage observed on Hort’s vehicle.
A contusion found on King that was discovered during the autopsy matched the shape of the hood bracket on Hort’s vehicle. A paint chip that was found in King’s hair during the autopsy is consistent with the paint from Hort’s vehicle, according to the report.
Hort stated that after the incident, he only called his wife. A police examination of his phone shows a series of text messages and calls right after the crash, with at least six calls placed or received in a 45-minute time span after the estimated time of the crash.
In an interview with police, Hort said he saw the first news account of King’s death on the evening of April 18 and that he believes he had no connection to the event because the news account identified the timing of the collision as 9 p.m., where he was just arriving at home in State College at that time.
During a search on Hort’s phone, police discovered geo-locational information that placed Hort’s phone in close proximity to the scene of the incident at 8:29 p.m.
According to the report, a search of Hort’s browser history showed that at 4:48 a.m. on April 18, he searched the internet for the Centre Daily Times, going to the “local news” section and the “crime” section before going to an article about the hit and run.
After viewing that article, Hort went to the Twitter page for Pennsylvania State Police Troop G, PIO and accessed a post about the hit and run, according to police.
The charge of “accidents involving personal injury or death” is a second-degree felony, with a maximum prison sentence up to 10 years and a maximum fine of $25,000.