Concert Draws 3,000 to Aid of Crash Victim

About 3,000 people brought blankets, lawn chairs and picnic dinners to Newport Beach Country Club on Thursday to hear Bill Medley of the Righteous Brothers in a benefit concert for a teenager who remains in a coma after a car accident.

Amanda Arthur, a Newport Harbor High School cheerleader captain, and nine other students were in a Ford Bronco that flipped over on a tricky turn, killing senior Donny Bridgman and leaving Amanda, 17, with severe brain damage.

Amanda’s family did not have medical insurance, and the community has rallied to help them pay her hospital bills.

Medley, who lives in Newport Beach, said he was out of town when the accident happened but heard about it from his wife, Paula, who was deeply moved. Amanda’s plight, he said, hit home for them as parents and as members of the community.

“We have a 10-year-old daughter and I have a 32-year-old son,” Medley said before the show. Also, a close friend of the family has a daughter who attends Newport Harbor, Medley said.

“Paula suggested I join whatever effort the community had going and then it just evolved into this concert,” Medley said. “I’m a pretty blessed guy, and it’s a real pleasure to be able to do this kind of thing.”

In spite of the sobering purpose for the concert, a light and breezy atmosphere characterized the evening.

Friends and neighbors picnicked together, many wearing T-shirts and pins that bore Amanda’s name. Meanwhile, Irvine and Newport Beach cheerleaders practiced the routines they would perform in Amanda’s honor, spritzing their ponytails into place with hair spray and dropping into splits.

And the benefit brought out donors and donations from unexpected quarters. One man from Irvine anonymously delivered a $1,000 check; the Compton and Irvine branches of Western Waste Industries combined to donate another $1,000 to the event, and the president of UCI Brain Imaging Center, Peggy Goldwater Clay, offered to underwrite a Positive Emissions Topography, or PET, scan of Amanda’s brain.

PET scans typically cost about $2,500, Clay said, and they pinpoint areas of the brain that have suffered damage.