A man is dead after a driver struck him with a white SUV or truck near 5th Avenue and Indian School Road in Midtown Phoenix and sped off before officers arrived. Phoenix police were called to the scene around 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, and first responders rushed the man to a hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.
The driver remains at large, according to police, and the vehicle fled before officers reached the crash site, as reported by AZ Family. The man's identity has not been publicly released. Indian School Road was closed from 3rd Avenue to 7th Avenue and was expected to remain shut into the night as investigators worked the scene, per the outlet's report.
Police Ask Public for Tips on Fleeing Vehicle
Anyone with information on the crash is asked to call Phoenix police or Silent Witness, which has a phone line at 480-WITNESS and a Spanish-language line at 480-TESTIGO, the station notes. Investigators have not released further details on the vehicle beyond its description as a white SUV or truck.
The case marks the second fatal pedestrian crash on this stretch of Indian School Road in less than a week. Just four days earlier, on September 4, Phoenix police responded to another deadly pedestrian collision two blocks west near 7th Avenue, a crash Hoodline previously covered, according to KPNX 12News.
A Corridor Already Marked as Arizona's Deadliest for Pedestrians
Indian School Road has drawn scrutiny for years as one of the state's most dangerous streets for people on foot. A 2026 analysis of 25 years of federal crash data designated the corridor as the single deadliest pedestrian road in the Phoenix metro area, logging 118 pedestrian fatalities since 2000, according to AZ Law Now. The City of Phoenix's Vision Zero Road Safety Action Plan, adopted in September 2022, had already flagged key intersections along the road as carrying the highest crash risk citywide within the city's High Injury Network, per the same outlet's reporting.
The timing of the crash also fits a grim statewide pattern. ADOT crash statistics show that 200 of Arizona's 263 pedestrian deaths in 2024, or 76%, occurred in dark conditions, with 6 to 7 p.m. recorded as the single most dangerous hour for pedestrian collisions statewide. Maricopa County alone accounted for 158 of those 263 pedestrian fatalities, roughly 60% of the state's total, the outlet reports.
City Has a Fix Planned, But Not Until 2028
Phoenix has a redesign in the works for the corridor. The city's ReVISIONing Indian School Road project, backed by a $24.96 million federal Safe Streets and Roads for All grant, is slated to add raised medians, modernized signals and HAWK pedestrian crossings starting in 2028, according to the City of Phoenix. That timeline offers little immediate relief for a street that has already seen two fatal pedestrian crashes within a single week this September.
Citywide, pedestrian deaths account for roughly 44% of all Phoenix traffic fatalities despite representing a much smaller share of total crashes, per the Daily Independent. Statewide, ADOT's 2024 Motor Vehicle Crash Facts report recorded 16,136 hit-and-run collisions, resulting in 86 deaths.
What the Fleeing Driver Could Face
Arizona law treats leaving the scene of a fatal crash as a serious felony. Under Arizona Revised Statutes § 28-661, fleeing the scene of a crash involving death or serious injury is charged as a Class 3 felony carrying up to 8 years in prison, escalating to a Class 2 felony with up to 12.5 years if the fleeing driver caused the crash, according to the Tamou Law Group. Beyond criminal charges, the same statute mandates an administrative driver's license revocation of up to 10 years for anyone convicted of fleeing a fatal crash scene, a penalty enforced independently of any criminal sentence, per AZ Law Now.
The crash near 5th Avenue is at least the second Indian School Road hit-and-run this year that Hoodline has covered, following an April case in which a driver was arrested after a fatal hit near 16th Street. Phoenix police have not said whether the driver in Tuesday's crash has been identified or located, and the exact make and model of the suspect vehicle remains unknown.
