MELBOURNE, Fla. – The man accused of killing a bicyclist in a Brevard County hit-and-run crash Tuesday was looking at his phone for 50 seconds when he struck the victim, according to a Florida Highway Patrol report.
Troopers said the crash happened on State Road A1A and Harmony Place just before 10 a.m. Troopers said Brevard County deputies and Melbourne police located the suspected Dodge Dakota truck and driver, identified as 32-year-old Kevin Shamoy Percell, involved in the crash about three miles away.
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Percell told troopers he was traveling north on SR-A1A on his way to a pool cleaning job when he looked down at his phone for GPS directions and then received a text message, “which caught his attention,” documents show. The report states he looked at the phone “for what he described was 50 seconds.”
When he looked back up, Percell told troopers he was in the southbound lane when he struck the bicyclist and “then panicked,” driving north on SR-A1A.
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The FHP said video was provided from a business that shows the pickup truck “traveling across the southbound lane” and “the vehicle is seen striking the bicyclist.”
‘’The driver seems to be remorseful. He just admits he made a mistake and he got really scared,’’ Lt. Channing Taylor said.
Percell is charged with leaving the scene of a crash involving a death. The FHP said Percell was not impaired.