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Letter to the editor

Family buries daughter, then issues a plea

The D'Addios ask the driver to come forward after their 5-year-old is killed crossing Gulf Boulevard during a vacation.

By LEONORA LaPETER
Published December 2, 2004

Anne D'Addio cannot understand how any motorist could run over her 5-year-old daughter, then drive away.

"I hit a squirrel and I have to stop," Mrs. D'Addio said. "I need somebody to come forward so I can feel closure on my end because somebody out there killed my little girl. I need to know that person has been found. I want my baby back."

Her child, Victoria D'Addio, was buried Tuesday in Connecticut with a Tweety bird in her arms and an angel on a chain around her neck, the latter a gift from a new friend who helped her build her last sandcastle on a beach a thousand miles away.

Victoria was vacationing with her mother and brother in St. Pete Beach last week when she was killed in a hit-and-run accident while crossing Gulf Boulevard.

"Making funeral arrangements for your 5-year-old daughter, it just doesn't get much worse than that," Anne D'Addio said Wednesday, a day after she buried Victoria, whom she called "Tori."

For now, the mother is left with the memories of a little girl who lit up the room with her smile, who liked to swim and dance and play soccer and baseball with her brother. Who loved blowing bubbles and listening to wind chimes and whose favorite character was Tweety, so much so that it will be engraved on her tombstone along with her name and the years of her birth and death.

She also has her final memory of her daughter, the one in which Victoria's foot reaches for the curb on a four-lane road in St. Pete Beach and a car comes out of nowhere and her daughter is flying through the air.

Mrs. D'Addio, a 38-year-old paralegal who is divorced from the children's father, had come to Florida to celebrate her son's birthday. Her brother, who lives in Tampa, had sent three airplane tickets so he could take Dylan, her son, to a Tampa Bay Buccaneers game.

They selected the Alden Beach Resort at 5900 Gulf Boulevard, because her son liked that it had heated pools and hot tubs.

Victoria became friends with another 5-year-old girl. They shared a chocolate milkshake and built a sandcastle.

The night of Nov. 23, the family was crossing Gulf Boulevard after getting a takeout dinner from Skidder's Restaurant. Mrs. D'Addio said not many cars were on the four-lane road as she and her two children crossed the first two lanes together and made it to a turn lane.

They looked again, and continued to cross.

"My daughter, she was going to race Dylan," Mrs. D'Addio said. "I swear she had one foot on the curb (of the sidewalk) when it happened. I didn't see the car coming until I saw my daughter flying through the air."

Mrs. D'Addio never saw the car, but a driver who called 911 reported seeing the white mid-sized sedan that hit Victoria stop 300 feet from the accident. When the witness looked up again after calling police, the car was gone.

Fifteen police and firefighters fanned out on Gulf Boulevard Tuesday night, about the time Victoria was hit a week ago, and stopped all four lanes of traffic, handing out 2,000 fliers to motorists with information about the hit and run driver, said St. Pete Beach police Lt. Dean Horianopoulos.

The St. Pete Beach Police Department has been investigating some 200 tips, but so far they don't have any suspects.

"It's a big case," he said. "Is it at the top of our priority list? This is No. 1 as a unit. We're trying to reach out to the community."

They are searching for a late '80s or early '90s model with possible front-end damage, Florida plates and a handicapped tag hanging from the rearview mirror. The driver might be an elderly woman with white or gray hair. Anyone with information should call the department at 363-9200.

Patricia D'Addio, Victoria's 65-year-old grandmother, implored whoever was driving to come forward and give the family closure.

"It's beyond thinking how anybody could do something as devastating as this and not come forward," she said.

Victoria was buried on a cloudy day in Cheshire in a plot originally reserved for her grandparents. As the crowd of 250 sang Amazing Grace, the clouds opened up and beams of light shone down on Victoria's casket, and Mrs. D'Addio said she knew it was a sign her daughter was going to a good place.

Times researcher John Martin contributed to this story.

[Last modified December 2, 2004, 09:28:48]