"A Chatham County elementary school teacher en route to work early Monday was killed after a man trying to flee federal immigration agents rammed her vehicle on Whitefield Avenue near the Truman Parkway, according to county police.
Linda Davis, a longtime teacher at Herman W. Hesse K-8 School was pulled from her crushed Lexus sedan by emergency personnel but later pronounced dead at the hospital. The driver who allegedly hit her, 38-year-old Oscar Vasquez-Lopez, was arrested by Chatham County Police and charged with homicide and reckless driving, police said.
The fatal collision occurred around 7:20 a.m. less than a half mile from Hesse after agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) tried to pull over the vehicle driven by Vasquez-Lopez, according to police and eyewitnesses.
Although Monday was a school holiday, Davis was due to attend teacher training that morning at the elementary school that serves a large number of Spanish-speaking children. Vasquez-Lopez appears to have driven through the red light on Whitefield on the east side of the Truman at such speed that the front and side of Davis' vehicle was crushed, witnesses told The Current GA.
Around 7:30 a.m., before emergency workers arrived at the scene, two masked immigration agents dressed in tactical gear detained one person and ushered him to one of their two vehicles parked along Whitefield Avenue, according to two eyewitnesses. It is unclear if that person was Vasquez-Lopez or someone else.
It is unclear whether federal agents offered any emergency assistance to the special needs teacher. Three eyewitnesses told The Current that they did not see anyone attending the mangled black Lexus before Chatham emergency services arrived at 7:45 a.m. and pried Davis from her vehicle.
Chatham County police said that they had not been aware of any planned immigration enforcement operations on Monday and were not involved in any when the collision occurred."
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ICE, looking for suspects, apparently decided to harass around an elementary school, began a car chase in an area where they put others at risk. This led to a crash that took Linda Davis's life. The so-called criminal, Vasquez-Lopez, had NO criminal record.* The chase was dangerous and unwarranted.
But this hits even closer to home for us than even Savannah. Two of the witnesses were people we know. I haven't seen their names in print, so I won't name them. One is a lifelong friend of Alison's who grew up in Pierce County. The other is a close friend of one of our church family, and I believe grew up in Ware County. They are both good friends and good people, ones we still see several times a year. They escorted us around Savannah a few years ago and were great hosts, hitting up a lot of the foodie spots.
One of them worked at the school system with Linda Davis. Both of them adored her. Both of them were horrified by what ICE had done.
No one is safe. The horrors of the Trump administration will affect us all.
Even if you think the undocumented are a problem that needs to be dealt with, I think you have to agree that this is not the way to go about it. Too many innocents are being killed or wounded, many others are having their lives and families disrupted, and some are just disappearing to God knows where.
Remember, being undocumented is a civil offense, not a criminal one. THE UNDOCUMENTED ARE NOT CRIMINALS.
If you live in Southeast Georgia, you should be looking at The Current GA. Please search for it or link it to your social media. There are few truly independent, investigative news sources left. We should cherish those that we can find.
Until next time.
T. M. Strait
AOC '28
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