ORANGEVALE, Calif. — Long time Orangevale resident John Wootton is seeking justice for his dog Cooper who was hit by a car and killed Saturday.
Wootton and Cooper, who has been with the family for nearly five years, went out for a walk Feb. 25 just after 3 p.m., a short time after he had taken his other dog back home to rest along with his wife.
He says he's walked the route to the corner of Woodlake Hills Drive and Pineburr Court "a 1,000 times" in his 14 years living in Orangevale.
A short distance after they left the house, Wootton said a White Hyundai — either Elantra or Sonata with dark tinted windows — came at them.
"I heard a car coming over the hill... and they sounded like they're going quite quickly. They were accelerating, which drew my attention," said Wootton. "Then I realized they were driving straight at us."
Wootton says he was hoping the driver was only momentarily distracted and took the turn too wide, but quickly realized that wasn't what was happening.
"They just never turned. It got to the point where I was basically playing chicken with a car," he said. "I had nowhere to go because there was a wall where I happened to be walking."
The car then drove into the opposite side of the road, over the curb and into Cooper.
"As they hit the wall, they turned. I don't know how they missed me," said Wootton. "But they didn't miss my dog. He ended up about 30 yards down the road because they were going so fast."
He says he felt like the crash was intentional for only a moment but believes the driver was just "incredibly negligent."
"They never stopped. They sped off. They forced another one of my neighbors off the road because they were tailgating them," he said. "Then they were gone."
Wootton has filed a report with California Highway Patrol but says they can't do much without a license plate. He says he believes the car left the scene on Wittenham and got onto Greenback headed east.
He's asking anyone with information or security cameras that caught the crash to report what they saw so Cooper can get justice.
"I don't hold out a lot of hope, but I'm going to keep looking," said Wootton. "There are families in this neighborhood... I saw a woman with a one or two-year-old walking in the exact same spot with her dog. It could have been them. This person needs to be punished."
