Keeping her memory alive

Ryan Carter

While people around the world took time this week to pay tribute to

the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, friends of Anne

White and others who never met her remembered a life that came to a

tragic end outside a Burbank radio station.

Candles burned at the foot of a stop sign on the corner of Avon

Street and Warner Boulevard on Thursday morning, where White was

struck and killed by a motorist Sept. 9, 2002. Bouquets of flowers

and notes adorned the signpost in memory of White, who would have

turned 23 on Thursday.

Shortly after 10 p.m. on the night she died, the Burbank resident

was standing near the stop sign talking on a cell phone. She had been

waiting with friends outside KIIS-FM (102.7) radio station hoping to

see pop singer Justin Timberlake, who was inside the station.

Prosecutors allege that Cameron Duty, 23, drove his Ford F-150 in

reverse into the crowd gathered outside the radio station near Avon

Street and Warner Boulevard, pinning White underneath his truck and

dragging her for another block before her body was shaken loose. She

was pronounced dead at Providence St. Joseph Medical Center.

The incident remains in the memory of the residents of the small

neighborhood of apartments and duplexes across the street from the

radio station and Warner Bros. studios.

“For one year, we’ve seen the markings on the street the police

made showing the path he took with her underneath,” said Richard

Garland, a resident of Warner Boulevard who paid his respects at the

makeshift memorial this week.

Some who live near the scene of the crime prefer not talk about

it, but those who gathered around the memorial were willing to share

their thoughts.

Debbie Custodio, who lives across the street from where White was

hit, recalled hearing the collision and running outside, where she

saw White’s body.

“When you see something like that, it is just hard to forget,” she

said. “She was just standing there.”

At his preliminary trial in November, Deputy Dist. Atty. Shelly

Torrealba said of Duty, “He knew he had hit her, and kept going.”

Duty was charged with six counts, ranging from murder and gross

vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated to driving while the

privilege was revoked or suspended.

Jury selection for Duty, who is being held on $1-million bail at

North County Correctional Facility in Saugus, is scheduled for

Monday.