anguard V If it matters to you, it matters to us.
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH ALABAMA
THE
MONDAY NOV 13, 2017 VOL 1718 ISS 14
w w w. t he vangu ardus a. c om
Challenging mental health stigmas in the AfricanAmerican community SGA and USA Counseling & Testing Services will host a mental health forum. Page 4
USA Women’s basketball starts on high note
Jaguars end last home game with a win
The Lady Jags start with a win against Georgia Southwestern.
USA Jaguars beat Arkansas State in their last home game of the season.
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Hit-and-run investigation comes to a close
Cheyenne Sharp, a USA freshman, pictured with her boyfriend and USA student Nick Hacker before her hit-and-run incident. Photo courtesy of Ginny Reynolds Duron BY: RICHARD | ASSISTANT MANAGING EDITOR
USA Police identified the make and model of the vehicle that struck and injured University of South Alabama freshman Cheyenne Elizabeth Sharp in a hit-andrun incident on Sunday, Oct. 22 outside the University’s Delta 5 residence hall, according to Bob Lowry, director of communication and media relations at USA. A car matching the same description was involved in a single-vehicle crash that took the life of the driver, USA student Shandi Kristin
Jones later in the day, on Oct. 22, Lowry stated. The families of Sharp and Jones had no comment. “We put out the facts and we’ve told both of them [Jones and Sharp’s families], and certainly there is no win for anybody involved there,” USA Police Chief Zeke Aull said. “I do think the police work was good and that when you put it all together we have reached the right conclusion. But, there is no criminal charge that will be able to go forward. Normally if you hit someone and left the scene then we’d arrest you for that be-
cause it’s a crime, but, there is no person to charge now and therefore no crime.” The USA Police investigation included reviewing hours of video from surveillance cameras on campus, interviews with witnesses and information shared confidentially through the USA Police Department’s Silent Witness Program, according to Lowry. USA Police did not have much information at the beginning of their initial investigation. “There was not a whole lot of information at the time,” Aull said. “We had a witness that thought
they saw something and thought they could help us with a possible ID on the car, but our information was very limited and the chances, we thought at that time, at solving the case were extremely low. Little by little, you do what you do to try and investigate the case.” USA Police began by sifting through hours of surveillance camera footage and eventually noticed something suspicious recorded by a camera in the Epsilon area, close to where Sharp was struck, according to Aull. “We have over 700 cameras on campus, none of which caught the accident,” Aull said. “My detectives started investigating and looking at video and in all that time frame we saw a couple of cars pass near in front of the Epsilon area, one of which was moving quickly. You see some cars driving by at normal speed, but one particularly catches our attention. It looks likes it’s fleeing the scene and that caught our attention.” USA Police showed the camera footage to Sharp and a witness to the hit-and-run and both agreed that the car appeared familiar. Things started to line up and fall into place after USA Police received an anonymous tip through the Silent Witness Program. “We had someone tell us, ‘we believe the individual who died in a one-car accident that same day shortly after your incident was the person who struck your student,’ but we hadn’t put that together yet,” Continued on page 3