{"id":65547,"date":"2026-05-09T20:11:27","date_gmt":"2026-05-10T00:11:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=65547"},"modified":"2026-05-09T20:11:34","modified_gmt":"2026-05-10T00:11:34","slug":"fatal-crash-investigation-38","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2026\/05\/09\/fatal-crash-investigation-38\/","title":{"rendered":"FATAL CRASH INVESTIGATION"},"content":{"rendered":"
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On Friday, May 8, 2026, at approximately 10:50 p.m., officers responded to a traffic crash in the 1300 block of North Florida Avenue. Just before the crash,\u00a0a black Toyota sedan was traveling south on North Florida Avenue in the inside lane. At the same time, a pedestrian was crossing westbound across North Florida Avenue, not in a marked crosswalk. As the pedestrian entered the southbound inside lane of travel, he was impacted by the Toyota.\u00a0Post impact, the pedestrian, still in the inside southbound lane, was struck by a white Chevrolet sedan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Lakeland Police Department Patrol Units, Polk County Fire Rescue, and the Lakeland Fire Department all arrived on scene to provide life-saving measures. Despite the best efforts of medical professionals, the pedestrian was pronounced deceased at the scene. The drivers of the vehicles did not sustain injuries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Members of the Traffic Homicide Unit responded to the scene and took over the investigation. The roadway was shut down for approximately six and a half hours while the scene was processed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This remains an open and active investigation. If anyone has any additional information regarding the crash, please contact Investigating Officer Travis Payne at\u00a0Travis.payne@lakelandgov.net<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The pedestrian (deceased) driver was identified as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

John Parks<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Age 54<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lakeland, FL<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Toyota sedan driver was identified as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Angelique Fernandez<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Age: 22<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lakeland, FL<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Chevrolet sedan driver was identified as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jay Bloodworth<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Age: 40<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lakeland, FL<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Friday, May 8, 2026, at approximately 10:50 p.m., officers responded to a traffic crash in the 1300 block of North Florida Avenue. Just before the crash,\u00a0a black Toyota sedan… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":133,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"12","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAxOVwvMDZcL2ZhdGFsLWNyYXNoLmpwZz9maXQ9NDAwJTJDMzAwJnNzbD0xIiwidHh0IjoiRkFUQUwgQ1JBU0ggSU5WRVNUSUdBVElPTiIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiZG9pcyIsImZvbnQiOiIiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.1XvQu2IKB59VvEScIprGDBFvJtRnVIGdKubJuAO91R8MQ"},"version":2,"media_source":"sig","attached_media":[{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/jetpack.com\/redirect\/?source=sigenerate&query=t%3DeyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvbGFrZWxhbmRnYXpldHRlLmluZm9cL25ld3NcL3dwLWNvbnRlbnRcL3VwbG9hZHNcLzIwMTlcLzA2XC9mYXRhbC1jcmFzaC5qcGciLCJ0eHQiOiJGQVRBTCBDUkFTSCBJTlZFU1RJR0FUSU9OIiwidGVtcGxhdGUiOiJkb2lzIiwiZm9udCI6IiIsImJsb2dfaWQiOjE2MzA0MDY2MX0.U_zYovo6DU6rGmVDNCcVaS8T5NoCxYZ-ZoHqLir7pFoMQ","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[298],"class_list":["post-65547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-fatal-crash-investigation"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65547"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65547\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65548,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65547\/revisions\/65548"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}