A woman lay unconscious on University Avenue in St. Paul, and the people who had stopped to help her Tuesday night could hear sirens getting closer.
As some of them helped the woman, others waved away the oncoming traffic.
But no one could stop the gray four-door sedan barreling down the westbound lane.
Without ever slowing down, police say, the car ran over the woman and forced those helping her to jump onto nearby light-rail tracks to avoid being struck themselves. The car then dragged the woman another 20 feet before turning south on Dale Street and disappearing, according to St. Paul police Sgt. Mike Ernster. A couple of minutes later, police and paramedics arrived.
Antoinette Elizabeth Boxer, 49, died Wednesday at Regions Hospital. On Thursday, Ernster stood on the corner of Mackubin and University, asking for anyone who knows what happened to help police find the driver who killed her.
Paris Dishmon, Boxer's daughter, said she believes her mother had been drinking and had fallen down. "The people who were helping her were trying to help her get up," Dishmon said softly. "We are so grateful to them."
Dishmon was not with her mother at the time, but got a tearful phone call from her grandmother that night, telling her to get to Regions, where police asked her to help them identify the body.
Dishmon described Boxer as a good woman, outgoing. Caring. "She loved to make people smile," she said.
