A Henrico County man helping his mother deliver newspapers was electrocuted Monday morning after the vehicle in which he was a passenger ran off a road in Goochland County and struck a utility pole, knocking a transformer onto the vehicle.
The victim was identified as Ponji P. Carter, 32, of the 9200 block of Fisk Road.
Deputies were called at 7:13 a.m. for a report of a single-vehicle crash on Miller's Lane, one-tenth of a mile north of state Route 6, said Goochland Sheriff James Agnew.
Agnew said a transformer mounted near the top of the utility pole fell onto the vehicle, and when Carter got out to inspect the damage, "he clearly came in contact with high-voltage electrical power." The contact with 19,000 volts threw him 8 to 10 feet backward, the sheriff said.
He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Agnew said the only other person in the vehicle, Eugenia S. Walker, 55, who was driving, was taken to VCU Medical Center in Richmond with injuries that were not believed to be life-threatening. Agnew said Carter was Walker's son and that he was sitting in the back seat when the crash occurred.
Walker and Carter, who both lived on Fisk Road, were delivering the Richmond Times-Dispatch at the time.
Agnew said his office is treating the matter as two separate investigations: a vehicle-accident investigation and a death investigation.
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement