The families of Chester kids killed by Amtrak train say they want to hold transit authority accountable
At a news conference yards from the site of the deadly crash, Siana Gordan and Wydeia Kimble said they are speaking out so no other mothers experience the pain they've felt since April.
Jahaad Atkinson and Ah’Yir Womack were best friends, their mothers said Wednesday. They spent hours riding their bikes around their neighborhood in Chester, and often visited each other’s homes.
And the boys, 9 and 12, were together in their final moments: On April 29, they were struck and killed by an Amtrak Acela train while crossing the railroad tracks in a popular shortcut to a nearby park. Their families, joined by their lawyer, Emeka Igwe, gathered Wednesday near the site of the crash to discuss a federal lawsuit Igwe filed earlier this month on their behalf, and describe the impact the ordeal has had on their lives.
“Something has to be done. How were they able to get through that fence?” Jahaad’s mother, Siana Gordan, asked. “I asked myself, ‘Did I ever tell him to stay off the track?’ How could I miss that? I talked to him all the time.”
Igwe, in the lawsuit, said the National Railroad Passenger Corp., the entity that operates Amtrak, was negligent in failing to repair the fence it had erected near Engle Street in Chester’s West End. He said the fence had been in “severe disrepair” and had a hole large enough for an adult to easily climb through.
» READ MORE: Families of Chester kids killed by Amtrak train allege negligence by the company in a new lawsuit
Amtrak officials have declined to comment on the lawsuit.
The gap had been in place for several years, Igwe said, long enough for the tracks to become a widely used shortcut for Chester residents. On the day of the accident, Jahaad and Ah’Yir were among a group of six kids crossing the tracks on the way to the playground at Memorial Park. They were pronounced dead at the scene.
“Amtrak knew this was a danger, which is why they erected this fence in the first place,” Igwe said Wednesday. “Amtrak builds in poor inner-city neighborhoods and doesn’t invest resources to maintain its property there. That has to change.”
Ah’Yir’s mother, Wydeia Kimble, said the main purpose in filing the suit was to prevent other mothers from experiencing the grief she and Gordan have wrestled with since April.
“I pray no one else has to go through this,” she said, “and I hope everyone is held accountable. We need justice for our sons.”
Kimble described Ah’Yir, the second oldest of eight, as a good son, one whose absence has taken a toll on his siblings, who ask her about him every day. She has found some comfort, she said, in her bond with Gordan.
“We can always talk to each other without judgment,” Kimble said. “She will always have a friendship in me, and I’ll have one in her.”