Highland City Road Rage Crash Leaves 1 Dead

LAKELAND, FL -- The Polk County Sheriff's Office says a game of cat and mouse on U.S. 98 in Highland City ended with the death of a 27-year-old man.

Preliminary reports from the Polk County Sheriff's Office indicate that Friday, July 6 at 10:45 a..m., drivers of a black Nissan Acura and a silver Dodge Ram pickup began racing, switching lanes and cutting one another off on U.S. 98 at Clubhouse Road in Highland City. They continued speeding south on U.S. 98, passing one another, until they collided at U.S. 98 and Cypress Avenue Southeast.

The impact sent both cars crashing into a vacant pediatrics office where the Acura came to a stop. However, the pickup truck was propelled south through a plastic fence where the driver, Daniel Bagwell, was impaled through the chest with a fence post, said Sheriff Grady Judd.

"EMS rushed him to Lakeland Regional Medical Center but they were unable to save him," said Judd. "We have a needless fatality today."

The other driver, Brondon Manning, who is 22, sustained minor injuries.

Judd said the two men, one from Bartow and one from Lakeland, did not know one another and he doesn't know what precipitated the road rage between them.

He said deputies did find a crystal powder that could be methamphetamine in Bagwell's pocket.

Judd said Manning is cooperating but the traffic homicide detectives are looking for witnesses to help provide more details about what occurred.

Anyone with information is asked to call the sheriff's office at (863) 298-6200.10:45 a.m.

Video via Pasco Sheriff

(For more local news from Florida, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts and newsletters from Tampa Patch. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app; download the free Patch Android app here.)