Ryan Dunn’s passenger in fatal crash identified as ‘Jackass’ production assistant
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As the West Goshen Police Department continued to investigate the fatal car accident that killed “Jackass” star Ryan Dunn on Monday, police confirmed the name of the passenger who also died in the wreck: 30-year-old Zachary Hartwell.
Hartwell, of West Chester, Pa., is credited as a production assistant on the second “Jackass” movie and is listed on IMDb as a “car stunt driver” on the Bam Margera-directed flick “Minghags” (2009).
The fiery crash took place around 2:30 a.m. Monday as Dunn’s 2007 Porsche 911 GTS went off the road in West Goshen and burst into flames. The initial police report said that “excessive speed may have a contributing factor in the accident.” An investigation is still underway.
People questioned whether alcohol was the cause of the accident as images surfaced online of Dunn drinking at the West Chester bar Barnaby’s of America hours before the crash. Dunn had tweeted the picture; it has since been removed from his official account, but has been retweeted by many of his followers.
Film critic Roger Ebert took to Twitter on Monday and posted what some deemed a callous remark: ‘Friends don’t let Jackasses drink and drive.’
Margera, a member of the “Jackass” crew, responded with a profanity-laced tweet on his own Twitter account (though it has also been removed): ‘I just lost my best friend, I have been crying hysterical for a full day,’ and ‘Roger Ebert has the gall to put in his 2 cents,’ Margera said. ‘Millions of people are crying right now,’ he added.
Ebert has since clarified his statements in a blog post. Here’s an excerpt:
‘I don’t know what happened in this case, and I was probably too quick to tweet. That was unseemly. I do know that nobody has any business driving on a public highway at 110 mph, as some estimated -- or fast enough, anyway, to leave a highway and fly through 40 yards of trees before crashing. That is especially true if the driver has had three shots and three beers. Two people were killed. What if the car had crashed into another car?’
ShowTrackers, what did you think of Ebert’s remarks? Are people ignoring how alcohol might have been a factor in the accident?
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--Yvonne Villarreal
twitter.com/villarrealy
