METUCHEN — Fanny Chiarella had been to her husband's grave in a Metuchen cemetery, and was walking back to the bus stop, but as the 85-year-old woman crossed Main Street in a crosswalk she was struck by a truck and fatally injured.



Police said the truck driver, Juan Mejias, 34, of Union, was sitting up high in the vehicle and didn't see Chiarella as he made a legal left turn from Main Street to Amboy Avenue at 11:20 a.m.

"Purely an unfortunate accident," Metuchen police Officer David Liantonio said.

Rescue workers responding to the accident discovered Chiarella still had a pulse and rushed to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, where she later was pronounced dead, Liantonio said.

He said accident left the Mejias visibly distraught.

"He was crying, even before he knew she was dead," Liantonio said.

He said Chiarella had no identification with her,and officers spent harried hours trying to discover her name, contacting the Metuchen senior center and others, then alerted other departments.

Finally Chiarella's daughter called police saying her mother was missing, Liantonio said.

The daughter said Chiarella had taken a bus from her home on Plainfield Avenue in Edison to Metuchen, and walked to the Hillside Cemetery at the end of Lincoln Avenue, where her husband is buried.

Police believe Chiarella was returning to the bus stop when she was struck by the truck. Mejias was charged with careless driving and failure to yield to a pedestrian.