Driver who hit, killed intoxicated Bluffton man lying in roadway won’t be charged, police say
No charges are expected against a driver who hit and killed a heavily intoxicated man after he was dropped off at a hotel out of jurisdiction by Bluffton Police officers.
Andrew LeMaster, 40, of Bluffton, the father of five boys, died from his injuries after being hit by a car March 21 on U.S. 278 and Okatie Center Boulevard South near Sun City Hilton Head.
Investigators concluded that LeMaster was lying in an eastbound lane of U.S. 278 when he was hit by a driver visiting from Pennsylvania, according to a report from the South Carolina Highway Patrol’s Multi-disciplinary Accident Investigation Team.
The driver of the car that killed LeMaster reached out to police the next day when he saw coverage of LeMaster’s death on the news. The driver told police it was dark when he saw something in the road that he thought “fell off of a truck.” He could not avoid it, but his car did not seem damaged, so he continued driving.
When investigators went to his home to check on the car, they found damage “consistent with striking a person lying in the roadway” on the front of the car.
The driver is not being named because he has not been charged.
Prior to the accident, Bluffton police officers were called to a home in Mill Creek at Cypress Ridge, the neighborhood where LeMaster’s girlfriend lives with their three children, about a disturbance. In a police report, officers noted they were called after LeMaster tried getting inside a neighbor’s house thinking it was his girlfriend’s home. The homes in that area, neighbors and police have previously said, “look very similar.”
Neighbors told police they worried whether LeMaster was “suffering from some mental issues or whether he was under the influence” and declined to press charges. A bottle of Fireball, a cinnamon-flavored brand of whiskey, was found near the door of the home LeMaster tried to enter, police said in the report.
Terry Finger, an attorney for the Town of Bluffton, told the Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette in March that LeMaster told officers he hadn’t been drinking.
“There was not enough evidence to charge LeMaster with Public Disorderly Conduct for being grossly intoxicated in public,” Finger said.
However, relatives said that according to a toxicology report, LeMaster’s blood alcohol content was .495 — six times over the legal limit of .08.
Without enough evidence to charge him at the scene, no relatives to reach and no outstanding warrants, LeMaster agreed when police suggested they take him to a hotel for the night, Finger said.
Officers took LeMaster to the Hampton Inn & Suites, a hotel outside of Bluffton’s jurisdiction. Once there, LeMaster could be seen on the hotel’s security cameras “staggering” while making a phone call in the parking lot and “having difficulty walking up the curb,” according to the Highway Patrol report. Still staggering, LeMaster walked away from the hotel.
‘This was unjust’
LeMaster’s aunt, Lora Knoppel, said her nephew was heavily intoxicated with no way to pay for a room, and that police must have “known that this was not OK.”
“We all know even if Andrew was drinking Fireball or whatever he was drinking, this wouldn’t have happened if he was at home ... instead of being transported away for no reason or cause,” Knoppel said.
Since her nephew’s death, she has tried getting answers from the department about courtesy rides and has had meetings with the department’s command staff. The department, she said, needs to be held accountable and her family is “owed an apology.”
“There was no negligence on the part of the officers,” Finger said. “That allegation made by a family member is denied.”
Knoppel has said the family is considering filing a lawsuit against the police department.
LeMaster’s death is the second instance of a pedestrian dying in the roadway shortly after an interaction with Bluffton Police.
In January 2021, Kenneth “Kenny” Green, 52, of Bluffton, died after getting hit while lying in the road on Buck Island Parkway. Green had a blood alcohol content of 0.221, according to previous reporting by the Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette. Officers were called out to a Parker’s gas station after Green allegedly caused a disturbance while asking other customers to buy him beer. Officers drove him home, but he came back and later punched and wrestled a store clerk to the ground. Green was not charged in the incident and left, and then was hit on Buck Island Parkway.
Knoppel said she wants to see a policy change to the department’s courtesy rides policy.
On July 25, what would have been LeMaster’s 41st birthday, dozens of friends and family members gathered at Knoppel’s home to share food and memories. Afterward, his closest friends, family and the mother of his children, Nicole Remko, gathered at the spot where he died to put up a cross with his name on it.
“This is very healing for all of us, it’s the first time I’ve gotten to even grieve,” Knoppel said at the installation of the cross. “This is actually the first time I’ve gotten to visualize it, see it, know it.”
Her nephew was someone who loved the outdoors, who would’ve wanted to barbecue on the boat for his birthday. He had a lucky baseball cap that “he would rather die than go anywhere without,” Knoppel said. At his funeral, LeMaster had to wear a different cap because police were still collecting forensic evidence.
“We will remember him as long as I have breath,” Knoppel said. “I will always want answers ... this was unjust, uncalled for and certainly preventable.”
This story was originally published September 20, 2022 at 10:40 AM.
