The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is investigating a hit-and-run collision in which an assistant chief for the Los Angeles Fire Department allegedly crashed into a parked car, sending it 160 feet forward, and fled to his Santa Clarita home.
After the collision Sunday night, Ellsworth Fortman did not respond to deputies’ repeated commands to speak with him, even as they heard him talking on the phone in his backyard and saw him walking up the staircase in his home, according to interviews with the owner of the parked car, her aunt and Sheriff’s Sgt. David Shoemaker of the Santa Clarita station.
The man made “zero attempt” to respond, Shoemaker said.
The sergeant did not name Fortman or confirm that he was the driver. But Kimberly Ward, the aunt, provided The Times with a copy of a document a deputy gave her with the report number, which listed Fortman as the registered owner of the Dodge Ram involved in the crash and included his insurance information.
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