West Bloomfield Woman Found Crushed To Death In Motorized Parking Gate
COMMERCE TOWNSHIP (WWJ) - A 63-year-old West Bloomfield woman is dead after authorities say she got crushed in a motorized gate.
It happened Sunday afternoon at a tool and die shop in the 8100-block of Richardson Road in Commerce Township.
Oakland County Sheriff's officials say an employee arriving to work discovered the body of his employer, pinned by the company's motorized parking lot gate.
An investigation revealed that woman had reached through the chain-link fence, using a key to activate the gate, when she somehow became trapped between the gate and an electrical box. Although the gate normally opens automatically, for some reason it did not and she became pinned, investigators said.
Fire personnel responding to the scene had to disassemble the gate to extricate the woman, whose vehicle was still running with the driver's side door open.
An autopsy by the Oakland County Medical Examiner's Office found that the woman died of asphyxia by compression.
An investigation by the Oakland County Sheriff's Office and Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (MIOSHA) is on going. Foul play is not suspected.
The victim's name was not immediately released.