This story might take a little bit to tell. Please stick with me.
Friday Kalissa had the day off. I was busy managing a house full of childcare kiddos. She has asked me that on her days off that I call her and let her know we are going outside. Carver likes to play outside but sometime it’s a little boring for him and her for him to play outside by without friends. She ended up bringing Carver over to my house.
Kalissa and I were sitting on the back patio watching the kids play and chatting. She was lamenting that her old car, the one Karl drove while he was in Houston and short time after he was back, was still sitting in her back yard and had been for the last few months. When Karl got back from Houston he drove it for a bit and then hit a deer and screwed up the bumper really bad. He ended up getting a different car and the car has sat in Kalissa’s back yard since then. She wanted it out.
She had called the junk man but he didn’t come and get it. She was sick of waiting. She had called a junk yard and they said that she would only get $150 for it. I told her to put it for sale on a Facebook group. I said someone would like it for a demolition derby car or for a car to get back and forth to work. With a little bumper, grill and headlight fix it would make a great work car. I suggested she post it ASAP. Kalissa said the car wouldn’t start right now as the battery was dead. I told her to charge it and sell it. She asked for how much to list it for and I said $400. She had previously taken some pictures of the car so while I watched the kids she posted the for sale ad on the Facebook groups.
She immediately started getting people asking about the car and within about 20 minutes, she had sold the car. How cool is that?! She was thrilled. The car was FINALLY going to get out of her yard. She was going on and on telling me what a great idea it was to sell it on Facebook.
Well it got hot outside and lunch time was approaching so we all came in. I got he kids in, cleaned up and started making lunch. I told Kalissa if she wanted to stick around for lunch, I would be game to get a basket of fried food and split a hamburger from the bar with her after the kids laid down for nap. She was game for that.
Lunch was over. I started cleaning up the kids and food mess from them while Kalissa went and picked up the take out. By the time she was back, I had all the kids laid down for nap so we ate in the kitchen. While we were eating Kalissa was on her phone and saw this from the Fayette County Sheriff’s Office….
“Fayette County Sheriff – A 14-year-old Maynard boy was killed in a hit-and-run crash Thursday evening, June 28, 2018 and Sheriff Marty Fisher is asking for information from any potential witnesses.
We were both immediately sick about it. How tragic. How could a 14 year old be dead and what kind of person leaves the scene with a kids left there to die? Both of us were so frustrated with life and I mentioned that there was another hit and run that killed another kid in Iowa about a week ago. We both were upset by it all.
We finished eating. Kalissa packed up Carver and took him home to take a nap at his house. She was going to take a nap with him as she had to work the overnight shift Friday night.
About 45 minutes later called. She was upset and talking a little fast. The sheriff had been to her house. People had been calling in and reporting her car and her as a possible suspect in the hit and run accident. They thought Kalissa had hit the kid from the hit and run accident and then tried to quickly sell her car. The sheriff took extensive pictures of her car. He questioned her for a bit and then said he was relatively sure the car hadn’t moved for quite awhile. He asked that she take down the Facebook for sale post and wait a bit before she posted it again. People had been calling and calling into the sheriff’s office reporting the car as a possible suspect. He continued to sit in his car in her driveway for 15 minutes before he left.
Kalissa took the ad down…then she called me and Karl to let us know about it. She called Karl as he was the one driving the car when the damage was done to it so should he be called about it by the sheriff, he would know what was going on. Kalissa was kind of shook up about it all. She also told me she no longer thankful for my idea of selling the car on Facebook.
She laid down to try to go to sleep but her phone which was by her pinged and someone was sending her a message accusing her of being the hit and run driver.
She was so upset. She tried and tried to find something that would definitively clear her…(besides me, Craig and Karl along with the rest of our family) and she found this picture in her phone….
It is a date stamp on the photo of the car from when she took the picture that she posted on Facebook. She had taken the picture on June 11th at 3:44 thinking she would try to find a buyer for it then. She sent the picture to the anonymous person that contacted her through Facebook. She explained that the sheriff had been to her house and she was cleared.
She laid back down to try to go to sleep….no luck. Someone came to pick up a chair that she had posted on Facebook that she was selling. She said Betsy, her beagle, started freaking out and barking just like she had when the sheriff came and she was all upset and nervous that somehow the sheriff didn’t believe her.
She is completely and totally innocent. Kalissa was not in the Maynard area last night. She did not kill anyone and then flee the scene.
I am glad that people are vigilant and would report something if they were concerned. I am bothered that someone would contact her personally and accuse her of the crime. It makes me a little bit nervous for her. Enough so that I suggested she call the sheriff and report that someone messaged her. Who knows with people now days.
We are very concerned for the family of the boy who was killed. We all feel terrible about it. This was a terrible crime….but people contacting Kalissa with accusations is wrong.
So that’s how an innocent for sale post on Facebook had Kalissa scrambling to prove her innocence and us all feeling really uncomfortable.
I am sorry that this happened to all of you, but it seems that this is the world we live in these days. Unfortunately most all of the fault lies at the feet of the nightly news broadcasts.
It used to be that a person was innocent until proven guilty, but now the reverse is par for the course. Even in small towns like yours, it seems.
There is one possible solution to all of this however.
If the editor of your daily local paper would step up and write an editorial about how things have changed for the worse and the part that the news media has played in all of this, it would be a great public service to you, your family, your town, and all it’s law abiding citizens.
If it happened to your daughter, it could just as well have happened to anyone else.
So the time to stop the “guilty by assumption” mania is now, and the local paper should be leading the way.
Wow, so glad she had a pic with the date on it.
Sad that people are so quick to accuse and blame without particular knowledge. It was unfortunate that she chose that time to try to sell the car. Prayers for the families involved.
Wow!!! Just amazing that people will do things like that with absolutely no information. Just a crazy notion that hurts so bad!!! That’s a horrible situation for Kalissa. I hope she did report that to the sheriff. So sorry she had to go through that !!
Sorry she had to go through this. No one should have contacted her or accused her. A friend of mine saw a car with damage also and reported it to the sheriff. New damage overnight. Hope they catch the person who did this. I’d want closure if it happened to a family member. But let law enforcement deal with it.
So sorry for everyone involved here. The death of a young man is tragic but it’s so sad Kalissa is wrongly accused and harassed. Hopefully the guilty person will soon be found.
Remember lately the restaurant that refused to serve Sarah Huckabee Sanders? The name of the restaurant was The Red Hen located in Virginia. Well I’m from Vermont and we have a restaurant with the SAME name and the owner was receiving all kinds of nasty emails and phone calls. The restaurant isn’t even in the same state!!!! One person said, well you should change the name of your restaurant! People are quick to judge regardless when proven wrong!
Had I seen the picture on Facebook, and had not known who posted it, I might have done the same thing. I certainly would not have contacted her personally but I might have notified the police of the car being for sale. There are times when it takes a small tip for someone to “crack a case” and this could have been that tip. I feel bad she was interrogated but I’m glad the police are following up on leads.
Very very sorry for what is happening to your family. Social media does have a dangerous side for those that are innocent.
Wow how awful for Kalissa, hope the phone calls stop.
Jo, didn’t the deer accident get mentioned on the blog or did I imagine it?
And so exactly what Judy Adams said….here in Ontario, CANADA…a totally different country…we have a RedHen restaurant in a small community here AND they got thousands if bad emails thinking they were the restaurant in question re S Huckabee….. seriously … people …check your facts before jumping on a bandwagon …it might just be the WRONG wagon !!!!!
Jo, I’m also pretty sure I remember you writing about Karl hitting the deer on his way to or from work. Terribly sad about the young man that was killed and scary for Kalissa to get accused of something so horrible. Hope they find the real culprit quickly.