Suspect in fatal Suffield hit-and-run confessed with police closing in

Nov. 9—HARTFORD — The man now charged with evading responsibility in the Oct. 23 accident that killed a 20-year-old University of Connecticut student in Suffield walked into that town's police station unannounced Friday morning and confessed that he had been driving the sport utility vehicle that hit her, police say.

The confession — by Frederick Seymour, 58, of 19 Poplar St. in Windsor Locks — came after police had developed substantial evidence pointing to him as a suspect, according to a police report made public Monday in Hartford Superior Court.

That evidence included interviews with Seymour's girlfriend, who was with him in the borrowed Jeep Cherokee when the accident occurred, and with the friend who had lent him the vehicle.

Seymour admitted in his written confession, which is quoted in full in the police report, that he had smoked crack cocaine on the day of the accident but added that he doesn't drink.

Seymour told police that he was "driving with the flow of traffic, doing the speed limit" when — as he talked with his girlfriend — they "saw something flash across the road in front of us."

A friend of the victim, Meghan Anne Voisine, told police a very different story.

She said Voisine was bending down to pick up a phone and cards that she had dropped in the road when the friend noticed that a vehicle was bearing down on them so rapidly that "it must be flying." She said she had told Voisine to get out of the road once and repeated that statement with an alarmed profanity.

The friend said she believed Voisine stood up just as the vehicle hit her. She said Voisine "hit the hood and was carried a long ways down the road," according to the report.

The report says Voisine was located "approximately 65 feet north of the area of impact."

After Seymour confessed, Suffield police charged him with evading responsibility for an accident involving a death, which carries two to 20 years in prison and a fine up to $20,000, and driving under suspension, a much less serious offense. Police held Seymour over the weekend in lieu of a $750,000 bond.

In Hartford Superior Court on Monday, Judge Kimberly P. Massicotte raised the bond to $800,000. The judge said she was "greatly concerned about public safety," adding that the accident wouldn't have happened if Seymour had obeyed the law.

Seymour is being held today in lieu of bond at the Hartford Correctional Center, according to the state Department of Correction's website. He is scheduled to return to court on Dec. 2.

The accident was reported at 10:40 p.m. Oct. 23, a Saturday, according to police. It occurred in front of 220 East Street North, or Route 159.

Seymour stopped after the accident, got out of the vehicle, and went to the area where other people were attending to Voisine, according to his confession and other witnesses.

When Seymour returned to the vehicle and got in the driver's seat, he said, "I thought that the girl was alive, that she was being taken care of and I started to panic. I was thinking of everything I needed to take care of if I go away to jail, like my father."

Seymour said he went to the police station, where he arrived a few minutes before 7 a.m. Friday, "because I have been having trouble sleeping and I feel guilty about it and I want to do the right thing."

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