A 42-year-old Alaska father is dead, and the man charged with killing him walked out of jail on $5,000 bail. In Chicago, a 48-year-old woman was mowed down overnight and the driver simply vanished — the second fatal hit-and-run in the city within hours. When the cost of leaving a human being dying in the road is a bail number you could put on a credit card, the system isn't working for ordinary Americans.
Carl Tigluk Simmonds left Alaska Regional Hospital around 5 a.m. on the morning he died. His partner, Crystal Tickett, posted a desperate plea online hours later: "Please has anyone seen Carl Tiģluk Simmonds... He left the Alaska Regional Hospital this morning around 5 a.m. Please help be on the lookout for him. I filed [a] missing persons report." She didn't yet know he was already dead — struck around 5:30 a.m. by Jack Sabàto, the 32-year-old son of actress Virginia Madsen and soap star Antonio Sabàto Jr., according to the New York Post.
Sabàto didn't stop. He was "doing late-night DoorDashing," according to charging documents obtained by KTUU, and later called police to say he hit "something" that "suddenly appeared in the road" — suggesting he assumed it was an animal. Surveillance footage led investigators to his vehicle, parked at his workplace with "fresh damage to the right front corner that was consistent with a pedestrian strike." Police seized the car. Sabàto called cops about two hours after they found his vehicle, claiming he'd hit an animal and wanted to speak with officers.
A judge set his bail at $5,000. Simmonds leaves behind a teenage daughter.
Meanwhile, in Chicago, a 48-year-old woman crossing the 300 block of East 71st Street in the Grand Crossing neighborhood was struck by a white truck that fled westbound shortly before 12:30 a.m., according to the Chicago Tribune. She was pronounced dead at UChicago Medicine. Detectives are investigating — which, in Chicago's current climate, often means waiting. The Tribune noted this was the second fatal hit-and-run in the city within hours; the first occurred Wednesday night in West Garfield Park. No arrests reported in either case.
The Chicago Tribune reported the facts straight: two dead pedestrians, two drivers who fled, zero consequences so far. The New York Post covered the Sabàto case with the celebrity angle front and center — "Hollywood scion" in the headline — but still delivered the damning details from charging documents. What neither outlet pressed is the question that matters: why does leaving the scene of a fatal accident carry so little consequence that a suspect can be back on the street before the victim's family finishes grieving?
A $5,000 bail for a life taken. Two drivers who fled into the night. The question isn't why they ran — it's what the system told them they had to lose by staying.
