Mepham tackles drunk, distracted driving

On May 18, 2008, one second forever altered Jacy Good’s life when a tractor-trailer slammed head-on into her family’s station wagon, carrying the then 21-year-old and her parents, Jay and Jean. The truck swerved to avoid a mini-van, driven by an 18-year-old who, according to officials, was engrossed in a cell-phone call. The teen sped through a red light in Maidencreek, Township, Pa., apparently oblivious to the road before him.

Only hours before, Jacy Good had graduated magna cum laude with a dual major in international relations and German from Muhlenberg College in Allentown, near the top of her class. She was returning home to Lititz, Pa., feeling elated, chatting with her mom and dad, when she suddenly lost consciousness after the tractor-trailer struck her vehicle, she said. Her parents died instantly. Jacy spent the next four months in the hospital recovering.

Good told the terrible story of the crash and her painful rehabilitation during a daylong traffic-safety seminar at Mepham High School in North Bellmore on Oct. 19, sponsored by the Governor’s Traffic Safety Committee, the Ford Driving Skills for Life Program, the Bellmore-Merrick Central High School District and the Bellmore-Merrick Community Parent Center. The program, offered to Mepham seniors, implored students to always buckle up –– and to never drink and drive or drive while talking or texting on a cell phone. Wendy Tepfer, the Parent Center’s executive director, Saul Lerner, the Central District’s health and athletics director, and Michael Harrington, Mepham’s principal, brought the seminar to the school.

Good described the long list of injuries that she suffered in the crash, including a traumatic brain injury that left her speech partially impaired and her left arm limp, major organ damage, a collapsed lung and numerous broken bones.

“I was a kid. It’s not fair,” Good told the audience of Mepham administrators, teachers and students in the school auditorium. “The things I lost, I’m never getting back. My family was cut in half.”

Good’s older brother, Jared, who was 25 at the time, had attended Jacy’s graduation, but had left shortly after to visit friends, while Jacy and her parents headed home.