A man died after another driver rammed into his truck and dragged it across two blocks on Chicago’s Southwest Side early Sunday, according to police.
Authorities said the incident began at around 2:15 a.m. in the 5500 block of South Kedzie Avenue in the city’s Gage Park neighborhood.
The driver of a black pickup truck "intentionally rammed" a red 1998 Ford Ranger pickup, according to police, dragging it two blocks south to approximately 5700 S. Kedzie Ave. where it struck a tree.
The driver of the black truck then fled the scene, officials said.
The driver of the red truck, 21-year-old Eduardo Pena, sustained critical injuries in the crash and was extricated from the vehicle and taken to Stroger Hospital, where he later died, according to police.
"He was coming home from a get together with a few friends," Pena's brother Rafael said. "It's hard, but we're going to have to push through it."
Pena was father to a one-year-old son, and family members said that the boy was "the light of his life."
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Now, Pena's family has a message for the driver of the black truck.
"Whoever did this should just reflect, and see what he left behind," Rafael Pena said. "He left a boy without a father, and that shouldn't have happened. Come forward, because sooner or later, life comes back and bites you back."
Businesses along Kedzie do have security cameras, and police are expected to look at the footage as they seek out the driver of the other vehicle.
No one is in custody in connection with the incident, according to police, who have opened a homicide investigation.
