Actually, it's a "she"...Ronni Crooks. Amazing player; can play anything from jaz/fusion to funk to metal. If you went to NAMM shows or Frankfurt Music Fair you probably saw her playing at Crate/Dean Markley/Vigier Guitars, etc. or doing clinics. Anyway, freak accident...she stepped off the curb in front of a hospital and got run over by an off-duty NYC cop...the guy knocked her almost 100 feet and actually killed her but they took her right inside the hospital and brought her back!! Was in a coma for weeks and had no short-term memory when she eventually came to. Spent nerly a year in a wheelchair and on a walker. A really horrible thing. About the ony thing that didn't break were her arms and hands. The memory loss was a real problem to overcome...remembered HOW to play and theory but actually could not remember any songs ever played!! Had to relearn. Before the accident she was like a walking music fakebook....knew practically every song on the planet.
The sad part...the NYC police union got their lawyers to buy off the case and the judge came back frpm lunch the first morning and called in the two attorneys (but NOT the jury) and said he decided over lunch that "when you cross a public street, you take the risk of being killed...case dismissed!" I saw online that all files were "ordered destroyed." Nice, huh?
Ironically, the last song we'd released was more of a commercial/pop thing we co-wrote with a friend from Germany titled "Killed By You." It was a curse. It was just starting to roll on MuchMusicTV (now Fuse), was on a four-cut EP with three major artists and we'd just come back from playing in Europe...and WHAM!! I think there's a copy of the song floating around on YouTube.
