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FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. --
The Florida Highway Patrol is investigating a fatal traffic crash in which the body of the victim wasn't discovered until the next day by his girlfriend.
The crash happened Monday night on the Interstate 95 off-ramp to Oakland Park Boulevard. Delvin Lewis, 29, was killed when the car he was driving slammed into the guardrail.
FHP troopers found a car Tuesday that they thought was an abandoned vehicle. Later that day, the driver's girlfriend spotted the damaged guardrail as she exited the highway, stopped to check and found Lewis' body.
"She came back out here because nobody had heard from him, so when she came back, she saw the body over there. That's when she called," said James Habersham, Lewis' uncle.
Police said Lewis' car hit the guardrail so hard that he flew out of the passenger side of the vehicle. His body landed in a ditch behind a retaining wall, and it could not be seen from the road. But the car continued along the guardrail and came to a stop about 300 feet away.
FHP said the trooper had no reason to think a body was lying in the bushes so far up the road.
"We have had these typical calls in the past where you have a vehicle that's been involved in a crash and the person may be intoxicated or have a suspended license or for some other reason just leaves the car," said Sgt. Mark Wysocki of the Florida Highway Patrol.
Troopers said they believe Lewis was probably speeding. In 2008, police said, Lewis led Broward Sheriff's Office deputies on a high-speed chase on Interstate 95 after he allegedly beat up a different girlfriend and threatened her with a gun. Deputies finally stopped Lewis in Miami Beach near Mt. Sinai Hospital, where they shot him three times and in the process accidentally killed one of their own K-9s, a German shepherd named Oozi.
"Well, we had a little trouble, but he was on the straight and narrow," Habersham said.
Habersham said Lewis leaves behind an 11-year-old daughter.
Troopers apologize to his family and said they are still looking into the incident. They also pointed out that Lewis should not have been behind the wheel because his driver's license had been revoked.
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