PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A Philadelphia father is trying to get the attention of distracted drivers by talking about the loss of his daughter, to teach others about the deadly consequences of driving while distracted.
Joel Feldman is a Philadelphia attorney, but he's also a father with a message.
"For parents who drive distracted, their kids are two or three times as likely to drive distracted as other kids," he noted.
Joel lost his daughter in the summer of 2009, when a distracted driver ran a stop sign in Ocean City, then struck and killed his 21-year-old daughter Casey.
Casey Feldman had dreamed of becoming a journalist, and took part in the KYW Newsradio Newstudies program while in high school.
Though her voice was silenced four years after her Newstudies report was heard on KYW, it ended up giving rise to his.
"I think that telling her story and keeping other people safe," he said, "it reduces the tragedy of her death just a bit."
Feldman has reached 200,000 teens and adults with his talks on distracted driving through his organization, End Distracted Driving.
And with distracted driving killing about 3,000 people in the U.S. every year, he's driven to bring distracted driving to a screeching halt.
"If you believe and you profess that you are respectful of other people, and you treat other people they way you want to be treated," he said, "you really can't drive distracted."