We report on car crashs all the time. Car X hit car Y... The driver of car Y died. Police are investigating. As a viewer it's easy to see such a story on TV and forget about it a moment later.

But this time, the day before Thanksgiving, the family of a victim in the latest big crash (three fatalities on the McKinley Bridge Tuesday night) wanted to tell us about the 23-year old man they lost.

His name was Rico Newsome and he was the father of a 21-month old girl named Ra-nya. He was the son of the retired Venice, Illinois police chief, James Newsome.

James invited me into his home and showed off pictures of his son, his son's basketball medals and expressed his grief. His close cousin, Lameeca Foushee talked about Rico's love of basketball, music and family.

Part of me is surpised when grieving families invite news crews into their homes. In this case they called us. Sometimes we call them. I would think they'd want to be left alone to grieve in private but after 15+ years in this business I see many families use the media (and I can't blame them) to memorialize their loved one. They lost a person, not a statistic and the Newsome family got to explain that to our 5pm and 6pm viewers Wednesday.

---