A man has died nearly a week after he was hit and trapped underneath a car in Surprise.
According to Surprise Police Department spokesman Timothy Klarkowski, officers were called to the Walmart parking lot near Greenway and Reems roads around 8:45 p.m. on August 13 after reports that a driver had hit a pedestrian.
Klarkowski said police discovered that the driver, 19-year-old Chet Becker Jr., and pedestrian knew each other and had reportedly been in an argument over how Becker had been treating his girlfriend.
As the victim walked in front of Becker's vehicle, he accelerated and struck the victim.
Becker then got out of the car and ran away, but was taken into custody a short time later.
Rescue crews at the scene used a specially-trained ladder company to pull the victim out from underneath the car by lifting the vehicle. Paramedics began life-saving measures and took the man to a nearby hospital.
Authorities said August 20 that the victim, identified as Samuel Zeldin, died of his injuries.
According to Klarkowski, Becker told investigators he intentionally struck the victim with his vehicle because he was mad at him. He was initially booked into the Maricopa County 4th Avenue Jail for felony charges of aggravated assault and leaving the scene of a collision, and has since been charged with second-degree murder in Zeldin's death.
