Sad News, CU AOII killed in hit and run

[DeltAlum]

I saw this really tragic story in this morning's Rocky Mountain News:

Hit-run suspect surrenders

Woman to appear in court today for accident that killed a CU student

By Owen S. Good, News Staff Writer

BOULDER -- A Westminster woman suspected of being the driver in a hit-and-run accident that killed a University of Colorado student turned herself into police on Sunday.
A judge set a $20,000 bail for Shana Lavon, 22, booked into the Boulder County Jail on suspicion of felony hit and run. Lavon is scheduled to appear in court this afternoon.

She is accused of hitting Jaime A. Frantz, a 21-year-old CU senior, as she crossed the intersection of University Avenue and Broadway at 2:45 a.m. Saturday. Frantz died at the scene.

Following a tip Saturday afternoon, police located Lavon's light blue Ford Escort, which lost its grill and a headlight in the accident.

Frantz, set to graduate in December with a marketing degree, was a popular member of Alpha Omicron Pi sorority. Sorority members spent Saturday grieving and Sunday planning memorial services.

"She was my role model," said chapter president Jenn Backhaus, who met Frantz when both were freshmen. They lived in the same dormitory and pledged AOP together. "She had a great relationship with her family and kept a balance between school and work. She was the most grounded individual I know."

Backhaus said she happened upon the accident scene soon after it occurred. The two and several other friends had been at a party and left separately. Backhaus left in a car and Frantz took a bus with Angela Edwards, who lived in one of five Grandview Avenue apartments Frantz and other sorority sisters rented.

Backhaus returned to the sorority house, then left with others to go to a convenience store. She at first thought nothing of the police lights at the scene since officers routinely stop drunken drivers on Broadway. But on the way back, they recognized someone from the sorority at the scene.

"We figured they'd witnessed a fight or something," Backhaus said, "then they told me (Frantz) passed away."

In the chapter house, members pieced together scrapbooks for a memorial planned for Tuesday. Flower arrangements and cards of sympathy from other sororities and fraternities dotted the parlor and sitting rooms.

"There's a lot of anger and confusion," Backhaus said.

Frantz had an internship with an advertising firm in Boulder, Backhaus said, and had hoped to be hired full time after graduation. She had studied marketing and finance, Backhaus said, but enjoyed the creativity of advertising.

Arrangements for a memorial weren't finalized Sunday, but Backhaus said the Tuesday service would be in either Mackey or Hale auditorium, possibly at 7 p.m. The service will be open to the public.



My condolences to her family and all of her sisters everywhere.