Dallas man dies in rental scooter accident
DALLAS - A Dallas man died after an accident while riding a rental scooter, police said.
Jacoby Stoneking, 24, died on Sunday at the hospital after falling off the scooter early Saturday morning.
A Lyft driver found him unresponsive around 4 a.m. Saturday in the 500 block of Munger Boulevard. Police said Stoneking had fallen off the scooter and called a friend, asking that friend to order a Lyft ride for him.
Stoneking had scrapes and bruising to his hands and lower extremities. Dallas-Fire Rescue personnel took him to nearby Baylor University Medical Center.
Police found a Lime scooter broken in half nearby. But they didn't find any other debris from potential other vehicles, leading them to believe the accident only involved the scooter.
Kenneth Moore is mourning the loss of his best friend and roommate. He said Stoneking was on the scooter as he left work from ZaLat Pizza on Fitzhugh Avenue. He was the friend Stoneking called after he fell.
“I understand freak accidents happen but I don’t feel like my roommate would’ve called me and said, 'Hey, I hurt my foot’ and then had a brain injury. He would’ve told me he hit his head,” Moore said. “I asked him, I said, ‘Did you hit anything else, did you hit your head, you hurt anything else?’ He says, ‘No just my foot’ and I could tell he was mad so I just got him a ride as fast as I could.”
Moore is trying to make sense of what happened.
“For someone to hit their head so hard off of the scooter going 20 miles an hour, to cause brain damage? It just doesn’t make sense. And like I said we were skaters, we take falls and hit our head all the time," he said.
Stoneking's father is also convinced there's something more to the story. He believes another driver was involved.
"Going from the police report and looking at the injuries, they don't match. It's obvious that they hit my son from behind," Jack Stoneking said.
The Dallas Medical Examiner's Office will perform an autopsy to determine Stoneking's exact cause of death. Lime said it will cooperate with the investigation.
"We are deeply saddened to hear the report of this incident in Dallas. Our thoughts and sympathies are with the family and loved ones. We are awaiting the results of the investigation, and we will cooperate fully with the authorities," Mary Caroline Pruitt of Lime said in a statement.
Electric scooters have become popular in Dallas. For now, helmets are not required and police said Stoneking was not wearing one at the time of the accident.