PHOENIX — Beatrice X. Johnson is dressed head to toe in purple. From shiny sequin pants to dyed hair to her hat.
It was her sister Dorothy's favorite color and Friday was all about Dorothy. It'd been two years since she was killed trying to cross the street.
Dorothy Dale-Chambers was killed while she and her partner, Joseph Gutierrez, were trying to cross the street near Perry Park in central Phoenix in 2022. The pair was unhoused and stayed at Perry Park.
On Friday, that's where Dorothy's loved ones ended their day of service. Johnson said they passed out 300 meals to the unsheltered population in her sister's honor at parks throughout the day.
"Every time we come the wind is blowing," she said. "That’s Dorothy and that’s Joseph. That’s what that means. Their spirit is still here and they are still with us in this fight that we are in to have accountability for both of their lives."
The crash
Dale-Chambers and her boyfriend, Joseph Gutierrez, were struck and killed by a truck on April 26 as they were crossing 32nd Street at the Yale Street intersection, about a quarter mile south of Thomas Road.
"We did a welfare check every week," Beatrice X. Johnson explained to 12News after the crash. "And my niece went to go check on her. And that's how we found out she had been killed. And she was laying in the morgue for eight days."
Investigation records indicate witnesses felt the truck driver was going too fast. The driver told police that he didn't see the couple crossing the road. The police report shows the driver stayed on the scene. The driver had a blood alcohol level of 0.031, which is below the legal limit.
An incident report for the crash indicates that Dale-Chambers and Gutierrez were not in a crosswalk when they were struck.
'High-density crash zone'
In 2022, the 12News I-Team uncovered that the city has known since at least May 2020, before Dorothy and Joseph died, that 32nd Street between McDowell and Thomas Roads is considered a high-density crash zone, according to the City's Key Corridor's Master Plan from May 2020.
In December 2020, Phoenix put out a call for bids to work on four different crosswalk projects across the city, including the intersection at Yale and 32nd streets.
The Phoenix City Council approved a contractor to do the work in April 2021.
And all four signal projects were supposed to be completed by the end of May 2022, according to the work contract. But that didn't happen.
And at the end of July 2022, the contractor requested an extension to Sept. 12, 2022, blaming supply chain issues.
The city signed off on the extension on Aug. 3, 2022. At that time, only one of the four crosswalk projects was finished, according to signal activation dates.
At the end of September 2022, the City said the signal at the Yale and 32nd Streets crosswalk was activated.
Fighting in court
Last year, Johnson filed a federal lawsuit against the City of Phoenix and others.
The federal lawsuit points to city and state data that indicate the intersection at Yale and 32nd streets and roadways leading up to it could have been unsafe.
The lawsuit also claims that the plaintiffs' civil rights were violated during the next-of-kin notification process after Dorothy Dale-Chambers died.
The City of Phoenix asked the judge to dismiss the lawsuit and the case is still pending in court.
The driver of the truck involved in the crash was facing misdemeanor charges in the case in Phoenix Municipal Court, but those were dismissed and the case was sent to the Maricopa County Attorney's Office instead. An MCAO spokesperson said the case is currently under review.
"We won’t accept it," said civil rights activist Fredrika Newton, who came to Perry Park to show her support. "We want to see justice done and that’s what we’re here for."
Johnson, Newton and more than a dozen others spent Friday evening saying Dorothy's name, praying and singing in her memory. They sang Dorothy's song as they released purple balloons in the air.
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