Kids, husband of missionary killed in truck crash out of hospital

The husband and young daughters of the Bartow County missionary killed by a runaway tractor-trailer have been released from the hospital, a family pastor said Saturday.

Kyra Karr, 30, and her family were on a few weeks’ furlough from their mission work in Italy when, on Thursday night, a tractor-trailer parked off Ga. 41 in Emerson rolled into the road and pinned their pickup truck to a guardrail. Kyra was killed and her husband, Reid, and two of their daughters were injured.

In her missionary work, Kyra focused on helping refugees and women in the sex trade on the streets of Rome, said Don Hattaway, pastor of Tabernacle Baptist Church, where she had been a member for many years.

“If you are looking for a person of human goodness, I don’t think you are going to find anybody better than Kyra,” Hattaway said.

Channel 2 Action News reported a $35,000 bond was set Saturday morning for Ivan Delgado, 52, of Rome, N.Y., who police identified as the driver of the tractor-trailer involved in the crash. Delgado has been charged with DUI, involuntary manslaughter, vehicular homicide and reckless conduct, police said.

At his bond hearing, Delgado told a judge that he is not guilty, Channel 2 reported.

Police believe Delgado was outside his parked vehicle conducting a safety inspection when the truck began rolling down a hill in Emerson, which is near Cartersville. Investigators said they believe Delgado was under the influence of a mind-altering substance.

It took emergency crews two hours to get the trapped Karr family out of their pickup, which the tractor-trailer had pinned against a highway guard rail. The family was returning home from a family gathering. An older daughter was traveling in another vehicle with other family members, who didn’t learn about the accident until hours later, Hattaway told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Saturday.

The husband, Reid Karr, was taken to the hospital and released badly bruised, the pastor said. Two of the couple’s daughters, ages 2 and 4, also are now out of the hospital, one of them with a broken leg, according to Hattaway.

The Karrs were “what you would consider a perfect couple,” Hattaway said. “Their desire was to live out their faith and help other people and show the love of Christ.”

They had been missionaries in Italy for the past six years and were scheduled to return there Saturday after their visit in Cartersville, he said. Much of their work had been aiding refugees, Hattaway said, but Kyra Karr — who he described as “full of excitement about life” — also sought to aid women in the sex trade.

Hattaway said it is a particularly challenging kind of missionary work because of the danger involved.