‘Selfless’ trans man killed while walking home from work

A young trans man, who had a “smile that could turn a day around”, was killed in a hit and run car crash while he was walking home from work.

Matthew Angelo Spampinato, 21, was walking home from his job at the Hares Corner Starbucks in New Castle, Delaware on the evening of 9 February.

He was taking his usual path along State Route 237 while walking from the Starbucks back to his home. According to the Delaware News Journal, he had almost reached the intersection with Quigley Boulevard when he was killed in a hit and run crash.

A Delaware State Police spokesman told the news outlet that investigators do not have any new leads on the driver that killed him.

Spampinato’s cousin Morgan Hanners told the Delaware News Journal that he grew up in Georgia but had always planned to move out of the South one day.

“He was very headstrong,” Hanners recalled. “Once he set his mind on something, he went with it.”

Samantha Strothmann, one of Spampinato’s co-workers, said the trans man was one of the first new hires after the Hares Corner Starbucks opened in October.

Strothmann remembered helping with his training when their shifts overlapped and describing Spampinato as a “selfless” man.