The boyfriend of a woman who was killed when her car slammed into a tree has admitted to cutting the brake lines to fashion a crack pipe.
Pennsylvania police say that 39-year-old John Jenkins Jr. admitted during an interview that he had cut the brake lines on Tammy Fox’s car the night before the fatal crash on Aug. 22. in Lackawanna County.
The mother of five was driving her black Hyundai Sonata at around 10 a.m. in Scranton when “her vehicle began to accelerate,” police said in a news release. The car crossed through an intersection before it “violently struck a tree.”
Fox, 38, died the same day from injuries sustained in the crash, less than two miles from her home in Scranton.
The police began an investigation after finding signs of tampering, and on Aug. 29, announced that Jenkins had been charged with criminal homicide.
“During an interview, he admitted that on the evening prior to the crash he cut the victim’s brake lines while at their residence in an attempt to obtain a metal pipe that could be used to smoke crack cocaine.”
Jenkins Jr. is now in the Lackawanna County Correctional Facility.
The tampering to the vehicle was only uncovered by a routine inspection of the car following the accident.
“99 percent of the time it’s mainly operator error,“ Urban said, ”but then when you look into it and that’s why we have these inspections of vehicles, then we determine, ‘Hey! This time it wasn’t the operator.’ This vehicle was actually tampered with and that’s what caused the death in this crash.”
The page paid homage to Fox, saying she “had the ability to bring light to dark times and gave selflessly to those around her.”
Any money left over from the Gofundme campaign goal of $7,500 will go to Fox’s five children.
Fox was born in Jersey City and a graduate of Scranton High School and Lackawanna College. Her funeral was held on Monday, Aug. 27.
According to her GoFundMe page, she leaves behind “a family of sisters, nieces, and nephews who loved her beyond words.”