Here's a staggering number: the World Health Organization reports 1.25 million people died in a car crashes last year. That's one person every 25 seconds.
The crashes ripped countless families apart in an instant. Several of those families are from South Florida. They shared their stories at a World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims event Monday.
Marisella Readon will never see her son grow up.
“We still have to live it, we live it every day,” Readon said.
Jayden Readon died in February. Boynton Beach police were chasing a suspect when he crashed into the 5-year-old boy near his grandparent's home.
“I celebrated my son's 6th birthday in September and he wasn't there,” Readon told a group of law enforcement officers and other parents of victims of traffic accidents.
“He wasn't there to blow out those candles, he wasn't there to make a wish,” she continued.
Readon has a wish for drivers to focus on the road.
“Think twice, there are always other lives at stake,” she said.
Car crashes is the ninth leading cause of death around the world, according the WHO.
Boca Raton-Based Dori Saves Lives Foundation fears fatal accidents are so commonplace that people just accept them as part of every day life.
Bill DeMott never thought he'd join the fight. Then a drunk driver killed his daughter last year and he made a decision.
“Not to hide, or sit in the dark,” he said.
He launched the Kerri Anne DeMott Foundation to give his daughter a voice.
“I struggle every day, but I get out in front of people,” DeMott said.
His goal is to prevent the next traffic death.
A lieutenant from the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office told the crowd Monday his agency has investigated 94 fatalities involving vehicles so far this year.
