TTC to Pay For Funeral of Teen Killed in Crash

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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Toronto’s transit agency, TTC, has announced to offer to pay for the funeral of a young teen killed after being struck by one of its buses, 14-year-old Amaria Diljohn. The grade nine student was the only child and lived with her mother in the city’s east end. The bus hit the child on Friday, near her home, but the operator did not stop.

Diljohn died at the scene of the collision, leaving her family and friends grieving and scrambling to raise money for a funeral. A trust account set to cover the burying costs only accumulated almost $2,000 till earlier this week. Consequently, Toronto Transit Commission chief executive, Andy Byford, announced on Tuesday to have authorized up to $20,000 in public money to pay funeral costs because of what he called the “family and accident circumstances.”

Having had made the decision, Byford stressed on Wednesday that the offer was not an admission of guilt on the part of the TTC. He said that “a single mom lost her only child under one of our buses just before xmas and couldn’t afford the funeral,” adding that “it’s the right thing to do.” Whereas on the other hand, transit agency spokesman, Brad Ross, pointed out that it was not the first time that the TTC had paid for the funeral of a person killed by one of their vehicles. He said that “it’s not about guilt,” so “let’s let the police investigation conclude. But there’s little doubt that Amaria was struck and killed by a TTC bus, so paying for her funeral is the right thing to do.”