For those that don't know Tony Stewart is a NASCAR Sprint Cup driver and he has a reputation for being a hot head. In fact he himself has gotten out of his car and threw a helmet at another driver as well as start fights with other driver or intentionally ram into other drivers. Last night he was at a dirt track race where he rammed into a young 17 year old driver and it looked like he did it on purpose so the kid got out of his car to challenge Stewart and Stewart hit him killing him. Half the people think it was an accident and the other half think he did it on purpose.

My opinion on this is of course I don't know what his intention was but it looked to me like Stewart aimed right for the kid and sped up right before hitting him. I would like to think Stewart wouldn't do something like this on purpose but really...it wouldn't surprise me if he did. Here's the raw video...Warning it is pretty graphic...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/embed/mtlTJAWFyRY" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>[/youtube]

Here is some more from one of Kevin's friends...I think his opinion of what happened matches up with the video...

Tyler Graves, a sprint-car racer and friend of Ward's, told Sporting News in a phone interview that he was sitting in the Turn 1 grandstands and saw everything that happened.

"Tony pinched him into the frontstretch wall, a racing thing," Graves said. "The right rear tire went down, he spun on the exit of (Turn) 2. They threw the caution and everything was toned down. Kevin got out of his car. … He was throwing his arms up all over the place at Tony for most of the corner.

"I know Tony could see him. I know how you can see out of these cars. When Tony got close to him, he hit the throttle. When you hit a throttle on a sprint car, the car sets sideways. It set sideways, the right rear tire hit Kevin, Kevin was sucked underneath and was stuck under it for a second or two and then it threw him about 50 yards."

I think the best course of action is let the professionals investigate the incident, not the court of public opinion.  In this day and age smart phones I'll bet the pros will get dozens of film clips of the incident from dozens of different angles before making a determination on criminal intent.

It was a horrible tragedy.  Why would anyone get out on a racetrack?  

Marsha

Last I heard Stewart is not facing any criminal charges but the DA's office is still investigating the incident.

 I don't know, it don't look good. He clearly sped up when he went by that kid.

Maybe he was just trying to intimidate him for openly challenging him like that but with an unintentional circuмsatnce, I really don't know.

But according to that video, it doesn't look good for him.

Thanks for the video peter.