WTHR |Community in shock over student's death

Community in shock over student's death

Indianapolis - The death of a north side fourth grader is touching the lives of his classmates and their parents. Christopher Beltz was killed in the parking lot of Spring Mill Elementary School just after being dropped off Friday morning.

Parents rushed to Spring Mill Elementary after getting notified by a telephone voice message about a deadly accident. Some of them feared it involved their children.

"They let me know it wasn't my son," said Maurice Bogle."I came to get him, to love on him. I just couldn't imagine."

"I did get a chance to see my son and I was very, very thankful that I saw him and some of his friends. It's a blessing. My heart goes out to the family," said Robert Cooley.

Just like police, parents are trying to make sense out of 10-year-old Christopher Beltz's death.

Benjamin Wright, a father of two, left flowers in memory of the fourth grader.

"It is every parent's worst nightmare, something that you hope would never come true," Wright said.

The school informed parents that grief counselors would be on site to talk with students. Some parents opted to talk to their children right away to find out the impact of the deadly accident.

Misha Cook has four children at Spring Mill. She recently wrote a letter urging the principal to re-evaluate drop-off and pick-up procedures and not just for school buses.

"They have to go around the car to get inside my car or inside the kindercare van," said Cook.

School police parked a cruiser in the second bus lane to make sure students don't cross traffic, something Misha Cook has wanted all along.

"If she can change it to the way it used to be where the kids can get in parent's car on the sidewalk so they don't have to go around the car and possibly get hit," said cook.

"Nobody wants to wake up in the morning, see their kid off to school and hear something like this. It's just a tragedy," said Cooley.

Several of the parents described drop-off and pick-up as hectic. That's probably no different than any other school.

Robert Cooley knows the dangers of school bus loading and unloading because he used to be a school bus driver.

"It's just a freak accident. You can pay attention. You can listen. I am sure this driver was very experienced, but children dash in between cars," he said.