Tennis champion Venus Williams will have something heavy weighing on her mind as she heads to Wimbledon next week: she’s just been blamed for the death of a 78-year-old man.
Williams, 37, was driving in Palm Beach Gardens on June 9 when police said her SUV blocked an intersection and another car, which had the right of way, T-boned her outside the entrance to the Ballenisles Country Club.
The passenger in that vehicle, Jerome Barson, 78, was taken to the ICU at St. Mary’s Medical Center with head injuries and died two weeks later.
His wife, Linda Barson, 68, was driving the car and said Williams darted out of the intersection of Ballenisles Drive and Northlake Boulevard, and she had no option but to hit Williams’ SUV.
Williams claimed that she’d attempted to make it through the intersection, but traffic slowed down and she was left in the middle of the road.
