By Milton Times Staff
8/13/09
Alison Regan, who would have celebrated her 26th birthday Aug. 14, will instead be laid to rest on that same date.
Regan, who worked at Randolph’s Boston Higashi School helping young adults with autism, was killed Aug. 9 in a head-on collision on Randolph Avenue. She was a 2002 graduate of Milton High School and a 2008 graduate of Curry College.
Her funeral Mass, to be followed by a private burial, will be celebrated Friday at St. Agatha Church at 10:30 a.m. Visiting hours are Aug. 13 from 4 to 8 p.m. at the Alfred D. Thomas Funeral Home, 326 Granite Ave.
Her father, Ricky Regan, described her as someone who loved her family, her friends and her job.
“She was a great gal,” he said. “She was everything you could ever want in a daughter.”
He said she still drove the 1989 Oldsmobile she’d been given as a present for her high school graduation.
“She was independent and never asked for anything,” he said. “She was just a talented, rambunctious, energetic person who loved life. You could ask any of her friends – and she had many of them.”
Police Chief Richard Wells, whose officers were at the accident scene, said his heart goes out to Regan’s family.
“It’s just a tragedy. She had her whole life ahead of her,” he said.
School Superintendent Mary Gormley also offered condolences, saying Regan’s family was always “really involved in the Milton public schools.
“As you mention Alison Regan, everyone has a happy story and a smile on their face, mixed with the horror of what happened,” said Gormley, who was Regan’s principal at Cunningham Elementary School. “My recollection of Alison will always be as a 7- or 8-year-old … to think, that she became a teacher.”
Regan was driving southbound on Randolph Avenue around 12:15 a.m. on Aug. 9 when Eric Lum, 29, who police say was high on heroin at the time, crossed the center lane while traveling in the opposite direction.
The two vehicles, Regan’s 1989 Oldsmobile Cutlass and Lum’s 2000 Ford Explorer, struck head-on, according to state police.
The initial impact caused the Explorer to roll over and strike another vehicle, driven by 18-year-old Kamilah Land, of Randolph, before coming to rest on a guardrail on the southbound side of Route 28. Land was unharmed.
Although she was wearing a safety belt, Regan suffered serious head trauma as a result of the crash. She was pronounced dead at Boston Medical Center.
According to her father, the longtime Milton resident was probably driving home from a friend’s house to her Dorchester apartment when she was killed. She’d shared the apartment for the past year with two other friends, he said.
Regan’s aunt, Kathy Egitto, a nursing supervisor at BMC, was on duty when the ambulance transporting her niece arrived. She had no comment when reached by telephone.
Lum, who according to reports has a past history of drug offenses, pleaded innocent Aug. 10 in Quincy District Court to charges including motor vehicle homicide, driving under the influence of drugs and vehicle theft. Judge Mark Coven ordered Lum held on $100,000 bail. He is scheduled to reappear in court Sept. 10.
Police said Lum fled the scene following the collision, hiding in a nearby bush until officers located him over an hour later, following a search conducted by the combined efforts of several departments.
Wells said officers initially thought they were searching for a body ejected from the SUV. Instead, they found Lum, who had sustained minor injuries. He was transported to Boston Medical Center, where he was arrested.
“There was a pretty massive search out there on Route 28 … 150 yards on both sides,” Wells said. “It was an awful thing. There was a large area of debris … a good half of a football field.”
Wells said he could not comment on details of the case because they are being handled by the state police. Milton officers were first to arrive on the scene because initial reports indicated the accident had occurred at the Chickatawbut Road intersection in Milton, Wells said. Quincy and Randolph police were also at the scene.