Family wants answers in road rage death

MORAINE -- Driving can be stressful. When we are trying to get home after a long day, the last thing we need is for another driver to cut us off, tailgate or swerve in front of our vehicle. Sometimes, that frustration boils over into full-blown road rage. Just search "road rage" online and you will see hundreds of confrontations between drivers, some violent. 

Osra Young, a 35-year-old mother of 4 children, was the victim of road rage on Memorial weekend 2015. 

"It's messed up. I would give anything in the world to have her back," said Young's sister, Cija Jennings of Dayton. 

An ODOT traffic camera caught the final miles and moments leading up the the crash that killed Young. In the video, you see a red pickup truck several vehicles behind a Chevrolet Trailblazer carrying Young and her three nephews.


"Both vehicles were driving at a high rate of speed, in excess of 80 miles an hour on northbound I-75," said Moraine Police Sgt. Jon Spencer. 

However, the traffic camera did not record what happened as the driver of the pickup truck made a move.

"At some point he decided to speed past the Trailblazer and then cut the vehicle off, slam the brakes on, which caused Miss Young to lost control of the vehicle and flip," Spencer said.. 

Young, who was not wearing a seat belt, was ejected from the SUV. 

"To chase her down, snuff a person's life out like that. My sister was not a bad person," said Jennings. 

Witnesses described the truck as a maroon, Ford F-250, occupied by a white male driver and possibly a second white male. They said the driver was older man in his 50's or 60's and had a full, white beard just like Santa Claus. What they didn't get, according to Sgt. Spencer, is a license plate number. Even the ODOT video was disappointing. 

"We've reviewed all the video from that and we've actually had the video enhanced and still, it's not good enough to capture the license plate number," Spencer said. 

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration tracks the cause of accidents on U.S. highways every year. NHTSA reports that aggressive driving causes 66 percent of all fatalities and even worse, the number of fatal accidents caused by road rage has increased every year of the last decade. 

So why, when our vehicles are getting safer, are drivers becoming more dangerous? We talked with Centerville psychologist, Dr. Dennis O'Grady, who treats anger issues, including road rage. He said we all need to be more self-controlled with our emotions. 

"This is about character. Anger is about a choice that we each make behind the wheel," said Dr. O'Grady. "Anger is dangerous. Anger kills. That's the extreme. In the middle, anger causes divorces. In the less extreme, anger causes my loss of peach of mind. I lose my heart. I lose my soul and I'm all upset about something I can't control, like somebody's driving habits."

O'Grady said therapy can help people who simply cannot control their anger. But for most of us, he said we simply need to take responsibility for our moods. 

"We can change our mood. Your mood is a choice," said O'Grady. 

Cija Young wants the man who forced her sister off the road to take responsibility for his actions. 

"Have some sense of remorse," said Jennings. "Maybe they would feel remorseful and come clean."

Sgt. Spencer admits the leads have dried up and he is hoping to shed some new light on the case. He also believes there are people who may have important information that need to come forward. 

"The way these cases work...it's a puzzle and people contain small pieces of it," said Sgt. Spencer. "We try to put the whole thing together and if we can do that, and bring closure to the family, then that would be great." 

The incident happened on May 25, 2015 at approximately 6 p.m. in the northbound lanes of I-75 in Moraine. You are asked to contact the Moraine Police Department with any information. 

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