Joliet Hit-And-Run Victim Dies: Coroner

CREST HILL, IL — On Saturday afternoon, Will County Coroner Patrick O'Neil announced that the final cause and manner of death for a 46-year-old Joliet bicyclist is pending further investigation by Crest Hill Police, toxicology results and autopsy findings. O'Neil said that Dennis Ledenbach Jr. died at 10:45 a.m. Friday at the Amita Health Saint Joseph Medical Center in Joliet.

O'Neil said that Ledenbach was struck while riding his bicycle in the 2400 block of Crest Hill's Plainfield Road around 4 a.m. and the motorist fled the scene. On Friday, Crest Hill Police Chief Ed Clark told Patch that his detectives still don't have any viable leads on a possible suspect or getaway vehicle.

Ledenbach was in grave condition after the crash and he was taken off life support on Friday.

A GoFundMe called "Honoring the Life of Dennis," has now surpassed the half way mark toward its goal of $10,000. A total of 94 donors had raised $5,101 as of Saturday afternoon, Dec. 14.

On Nov. 14, Will County Judge David Carlson sentenced Eduardo Avila of Joliet to spend the next nine years in prison for committing the fatal hit-and-run that killed pedestrian Tricia Hoyt along a frontage road near I-55 and Bolingbrook in November 2017.

Carlson told the courtroom that he gave Avila, a Joliet Junior College student who worked in the cosmetics industry, nine years of prison because Hoyt's body was left along the lonely and dark stretch of the road for nine hours until authorities were summoned to the crime scene.