Former Shelby Township police officer Jacob Lucas said his response to the car-pedestrian accident that killed a 13-year-old township boy was unlike any other fatal accident he has encountered in his career.
Lucas, a Shelby officer for five years, offered that assessment Tuesday in Macomb County Circuit Court at the trial of Albert Donadio, who is charged with two 15-year felonies for the January 2019 death of Anthony Jugo on 25 Mile Road in Shelby Township.
He described Jugo’s injuries as “gruesome.”
“I’ve been to fatal accidents but not like that,” Lucas said from the stand. “It was a kid. It’s not something we normally …. You don’t think about that with kids, you know, having to try to save them and watching them die, especially in such a gruesome kind of scene. It looked like something out of a movie, I mean just blood everywhere. I had never been on a scene like that.”
He testified it appeared someone had poured red paint over Anthony’s face.
Lucas, who is now an Ann Arbor officer, was the first responder on the scene within a couple of minutes after 911 calls from Donadio and Jugo’s companion, Ulisis Moya. Lucas said he talked with Donadio for a moment and then began performing life-saving efforts on Jugo, who was lying on the side of the road after being thrown 20 to 25 feet.
He told Assistant Macomb Prosecutor Rebecca Kelley he was calling Anthony’s name but felt no pulse on him and began performing CPR. His efforts seemed to last “forever,” he stated.
“When you’re doing something like that, especially when it’s a child, you feel like no help can come soon enough, no fire department, no one can get there fast enough,” he said. “But it was probably a few minutes” before paramedics arrived and took over life resuscitation efforts.
He said he was telling Anthony to hold on, that help was on the way. Paramedics used a defibrillator to try to save the boy.
Before attending to Anthony, Lucas said he had a brief conversation with Donadio, who told Lucas he was driving when “all of a sudden he said two kids were in front of him.”
He portrayed Donadio as “very upset.”
“He was kind of like distraught,” Lucas said. “He seemed like he was almost in shock at what happened, just very overwhelmed at the situation.”
Lucas said one of Jugo’s shoes was found at the spot where he was likely struck and another was discovered several feet away.
Donadio, 36, of Shelby Township, is charged with reckless driving causing death and driving while intoxicated or impaired by marijuana.
He is accused of driving a 2003 BMW on the closed westbound lane of 25 Mile Road and striking Anthony from behind at a speed of about 25 to 30 mph in the 50 mph zone. Signs indicating the lane was closed were located east of Hayes, on which Donadio drove, for westbound motorists to view. A barrier was located at Hayes and 25 Mile roads to prevent traffic from entering westbound 25 Mile. It appears Donadio drove into a condominium complex parking lot off Hayes and turned left from Cambridge onto 25 Mile, based on testimony and prosecutor statements so far.
Lucas testified he would have given a ticket to Donadio if he had seen him turn on to the closed road.
The boys spent the afternoon of Jan. 5 patronizing stores on Hayes at 23 and 24 mile roads. They were walking in the westbound lane and had nearly reached Moya’s home when the crash occurred. Moya testified he was next to the white line and Jugo was next to him, to his left toward the center of the lane, when his friend was struck.
There were no sidewalks along the road, Lucas said, and the area off the road was “very muddy.”
The west side of the road was closed for a sewer construction project.
Donadio, who grew marijuana as a medical marijuana card holder, had nine nanograms of THC, the psycho-active ingredient of marijuana, in his system shortly after the accident. A vape pen found at the scene contained marijuana and had Donadio’s DNA on it.
During cross-examination by defense attorney Peter Torrice, Lucas confirmed his written report about the accident that the area was “very, very dark” at the time, about 6 p.m. as there were no street lights along the road. Lucas said he when he arrived he activated his patrol-car spotlight to illuminate the area.
There also were no orange-striped construction barrels or orange cones on the road, he said.
The trial is scheduled to resume Wednesday and continue into next week. It had been scheduled to conclude this week but it was adjourned for two days last week due to Donadio’s illness.
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August 25, 2021 at 12:57AM
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Police officer calls Shelby Township fatal accident scene ‘gruesome’ - The Macomb Daily
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