The coming days will be a test of whether Douglas Parkhurst, 68, of West Newfield, Maine, will be granted redemption by public opinion. Can a person be both a hero and a reviled figure from the past?
In 2013, Parkhurst waited until after the statute of limitation had run out before he walked into a Fulton, N.Y., police station and admitted being behind the wheel of the car that killed Carolee Ashby.
She was just 4 years old. He was drunk.
“I know in my heart and I am 99.9 percent sure I hit that little girl with my 1962 tan Buick Special. I am oh so sorry. I can’t change anything but I hope this apology will be accepted and I beg for forgiveness,” he wrote in a four-page confession.
He didn’t get it and he subsequently moved away. To Maine.
Last Friday evening he was at a Babe Ruth game at a local park when a woman — she was drunk — tried to run her car onto the field.
#BREAKING: Viewer video shows a car driving on to the field during a baseball game in Sanford. (📹 Makena Murphy)
Police say they are on the scene: https://t.co/BwFdJjoUw4 pic.twitter.com/qQME3KRNxC
— CBS 13 News (@WGME) June 2, 2018
Parkhurst quickly tried to close a gate while he and coaches tried to get the kids out of the way, one of whom was Parkhurst’s grandson.
He was struck and killed, the Portland Press Herald reports.