Sun City woman killed in possible medical-related car crash, officials say
A woman from Sun City Hilton Head was found dead after her car veered off S.C. 170 (Okatie Highway) and struck a tree earlier this month, officials say.
Dorothy Barretta, 60, was pronounced dead the morning of March 21 at the scene of the crash. It happened at the intersection of S.C. 170 and Okatie Maintenance Yard, about a half-mile south of the entrance to the gated community on Del Webb Boulevard.
Bluffton police initially labeled the incident as a cardiac arrest, although Beaufort County Chief Deputy Coroner Shane Bowers said Barretta’s cause of death would be difficult to determine. She suffered a fatal amount of blunt force trauma in the collision with the woodline, he said.
Police, medics and coroner’s staff responded to the scene after a worker at the Sun City golf course reported seeing a gray Lincoln MKS in the woods near the maintenace shop around 8:15 a.m., according to a Bluffton Police Department incident report.
Barretta was entrapped in the vehicle and was not wearing a seat belt at the time of the collision, the report says. Coroner’s staff determined her death was not suspicious and chose not to perform an autopsy.
The coroner’s office had not yet determined Barretta’s cause of death and was awaiting toxicology results, Bowers said on Tuesday.
Troopers with the South Carolina Highway Patrol did not appear to have responded to the scene, spokesperson Cpl. Nick Pye said. The crash was not reflected in the S.C. Department of Public Safety’s traffic fatality count for Beaufort County, which as of Sunday remained at seven deaths so far in 2026.
Barretta’s obituary or funeral arrangements had not been publicly released as of Tuesday afternoon.
