Buena Park : Man Killed Trying to Pick Up Item on Freeway

A Lakewood man who apparently was trying to recover a spa cover that had fallen out of his pickup truck was hit by a car and killed Monday morning on the Artesia Freeway, just west of the Santa Ana Freeway in Buena Park.

The 22-year-old victim was hit by an automobile driven by a Laguna Beach man who was in the freeway’s middle lane, according to the California Highway Patrol, when he swerved to avoid the spa cover and found the victim, who seemed to be trying to make it back to the side of the freeway, directly in his path. The man was pronounced dead at the scene.

The identity of the victim, whose truck was found parked on the shoulder, was not immediately made public.