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After a fun night out, a head-on collision cuts young lives short.Behind one wheel, a young, single mother-to-be who just got a crib for her unborn child.Behind the other, a father of three who worked on elevators for a living and fished in his spare time.Also there, two 19-year-old passengers. One who skipped a hunting trip this weekend to stay home and spend time with friends. And an older pal.All five met early Sunday in a fiery head-on collision along a two-lane road in northern Hillsborough County, the Florida Highway Patrol said.All five died on the spot."Everybody's in shock," said Gary Crabtree, stepfather of Ashley D. Blagburn, who drove the car.Four friends got together late Saturday evening at the Dallas Bull, a popular country nightclub in eastern Hillsborough, relatives said. Blagburn, 19, was behind the wheel of the 1999 Chrysler Sebring as they headed north, back to her place in Dade City to watch movies.With her were 19-year-old Richard Forbes of Plant City, 19-year- old Jennifer Sawyer of Dover and 33-year-old Garth Durgan of Plant City.Heading south, passing cars on U.S. 301 was Danny S. Lamb Jr., 33, of Plant City. Witnesses told troopers that Lamb had passed several cars in his 2006 Ford F-150 pickup on the stretch near the Hillsborough River State Park around 2:30 a.m.Just south of McIntosh Road, Lamb again pulled into the northbound lane, into Blagburn and her friends.That stretch of 301, a main artery, has "good visibility in all directions," said FHP spokesman Larry Coggins Jr."It's pretty safe to say it was driver negligence," Coggins said.Lamb wasn't wearing a seat belt, troopers said, and was pitched from his truck as it burst into flames.Investigators have to wait for toxicology reports from Lamb's autopsy to determine whether alcohol was involved, Coggins said. That could take several weeks.Meanwhile, five families in Hillsborough and Pasco counties are left to grieve.Crabtree can't think of Blagburn, his stepdaughter, without seeing her face all lit up."She was always smiling, always smiling," he said. "She liked to be around people. I mean she was real sociable."And after moving to Florida two months ago, she had plenty to talk about.A new job. A pending promotion. New friends. And a boy, Tyson, due this summer."She started flowering," her stepfather said. "She started doing her thing."Blagburn was born and raised in Murphysboro, Ill. When she left to be closer to her mother, Tina Crabtree, in Zephyrhills, her stepfather said, it was for the best."When she got pregnant, she wanted to be with her mom," he said. The father of Blagburn's child wasn't in the picture, Crabtree said. So he and his wife of nine years did all they could for Blagburn.She got an apartment in Dade City. She was filling it with everything she could find that bore the Disney label. She also got a job at the Flying J truck stop in Seffner."Everybody liked her out there, everybody knew her," Crabtree said. "She was a hard worker."Five months pregnant, she had worked her way from the register to accounting. She was to start training for her promotion today. "She was ecstatic, that's all she talked about," her stepfather said. "That and the baby. She was proud."At the Flying J, where Blagburn and Sawyer worked together, relief manager Angela Kennedy said "they were good girls and they'd be missed."Outside the store, patron Kenny Arden said Sawyer waited on him a few times in the store's restaurant, the Country Market Restaurant & Buffet."I can't believe it," said Arden, 41. "She was a spark plug, that girl, just a little firecracker. I can't even imagine that we lost her."Ain't nothing right then. Ain't nothing right in a world we lose a kid like that."Family members congregated Sunday afternoon at the Sawyer family's home off Kirkland Road in Dover. Her sister Nancy, aunt Cindy Sawyer and cousin Brande Sawyer said Jennifer Sawyer was a warm-hearted and sassy girl who worked hard and loved her family."You could argue with her one second and go shopping with her the next," Brande Sawyer said.Like the others relatives of the victims, Tim Forbes thought of the good memories during this time of tragedy. He sat on his couch Sunday afternoon, just below a family photo of his wife and six children. He clasped his hands as he spoke about his son, Richard."Rick was pretty well a free spirit. He was a great kid," Tim Forbes said. "That might sound a little biased coming from me. But he was."Richard Forbes loved hunting, his father said. He was supposed to be in Georgia over the weekend on a hunting trip with a friend but changed his mind."He was great with a bow and arrow," Tim Forbes said.When he wasn't out mudding in his truck or riding the mechanical bull at the Dallas Bull, Richard Forbes spent time in nature. His father said he would walk through nearby fields in his rural neighborhood, and the cows would all walk up to him."He just had a way about him," Tim Forbes said. "There weren't too many things that he was afraid to do. A lot of times he had me worried. But I never figured it would end like this.""It's your worst nightmare," said his mother, Penny Forbes.Few details were available Sunday about Durgan, the 33-year-old in the car with the teens. Relatives of the teens didn't know much about him, though some had heard he worked near the Flying J.FHP troopers said he had been living with an aunt and a girlfriend in Plant City. Attempts to reach people who knew him were unsuccessful.Lamb, the driver of the Ford truck, was a married father of three young children, ages 2 to 10, his sister-in-law, Tanya Wynn, said Sunday.She described him as a fun-loving man who was devoted to his children and his wife of 10 years, Melissa."He was a wonderful father," Wynn said. "He was just a very happy- go-lucky person who loved his family."Lamb worked for an elevator repair company and loved to fish. A longtime Plant City resident, he lived with his wife behind her mother and father's house off Five Acre Road. A swing set and a child's playhouse sit beside a chicken coop and a meat smoker on the front yard.Family members were dazed Sunday as they tried to absorb the news. Wynn said she's unsure where her brother-in-law was going at the time of the crash."We don't have any idea," she said.
Books:
02 11 2007 - A skid mark is visible in the center of U.S. 301 on
Sunday morning following a crash that killed five people that morning.
The remaining debris and burned grass where the cars were found is at
right. About 2:40 a.m., a 2006 Ford pickup driven by Danny S. Lamb
Jr., 33 of Plant City, was southbound on 301, passing vehicles when
the driver slammed head on into a 1996 Chrysler, killing the four
passengers inside, said FHP spokesman Larry Coggins. Lamb was not
wearing a seatbelt and was ejected. He died at the scene. Ashley D.
Blagburn, the 19-year-old Zephryhills woman driving the Chrysler, also
died. So did all three of her passengers: Richard Forbes, 19 of Plant
City, Garth Durgan, 33 of Plant City, and Jennifer Sawyer, 19 of
Valrico. BRIAN CASSELLA | Times
TAMPAA Plant City man who died after his truck slammed into another vehicle in February, killing the pregnant driver of the other car and her three passengers, had a blood alcohol content almost three times the legal limit, according to his toxicology report. Danny S. Lamb Jr.'s blood alcohol level was 0.21, Florida Highway Patrol spokesman Larry Coggins said Monday. State law presumes a person is impaired if his blood alcohol content is above 0.08. Lamb, a 33- year-old father, was behind the wheel of a pickup truck that was passing cars on a two-lane stretch of U.S. 301 in the predawn hours of Feb. 11. While driving south in Thonotosassa, he crossed into the northbound lane and crashed into 19-year-old Ashley D. Blagburn of Dade City, troopers said. Blagburn, who was five months pregnant, died along with three passengers in her car: Richard Forbes, 19, of Plant City, Jennifer Sawyer, 19, of Dover and Garth Durgan, 33, of Plant City. Forbes' sister, Christina Forbes, said her family had "speculated" that Lamb was under the influence of alcohol at the time of the accident. But knowing for sure still doesn't bring back her brother or the others, she said.
