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Man commits suicide by waiting on tracks

Released from prison a few months ago, he didn't come back from a night of drinking.

By JAMAL THALJI
Published July 20, 2005

LACOOCHEE - He was sitting on the railroad tracks, smoking a cigarette, the train rapidly approaching.

Then the man stood up, witnesses said, still puffing on his cigarette.

The result was a suicide Tuesday morning, authorities say, as David Hines took his own life by placing it in front of a 4,199-ton freight train.

The conductor of the northbound Tampa-to-Baldwin CSX train saw the Land O'Lakes man on the tracks but couldn't stop the train in time, according to the Pasco Sheriff's Office.

The company said the two-engine, 98-car train was traveling below the 55 mph speed limit allowed on that stretch of tracks. No employees were injured.

The incident occurred at 9:58 a.m. about 350 yards south of Mickler Road, half a mile from where U.S. 98 splits off northbound U.S. 301.

It was about 11:30 a.m. when two men came to the scene, concerned that the body lying on the west side of the tracks might be the acquaintance who hadn't come home the night before.

They feared it might be a David Hines they knew, a 39-year-old who lived in Tampa with an arrest record on charges of larceny, grand theft, shoplifting and battery stretching back to 1992.

State records show Hines was released in February from the minimum security Apalachee Correctional Institution, East Unit, after serving a year sentence for a charge of aggravated assault with a weapon.

Hines was staying with a friend in east Pasco, trying to get on with his life, they said, when he went out drinking Monday night and didn't come home.

After speaking with a detective, the men left.

[Last modified July 20, 2005, 00:58:13]