By Mark Hansel
NKyTribune managing editor
Boone County Sheriff’s investigators are still searching for answers in the death of Allen Williams of Hebron.
Members of Allen Williams’ Snap Fitness gym family in Hebron held a benefit workout to honor his memory and raise funds to help cover funeral expenses a few weeks ago (photos by Mark Hansel). Click to enlarge.
Williams, 48, was struck and killed in the early morning hours of August 26, while riding his bicycle northbound on North Bend Road (KY 237), near Northside Drive in Hebron.
More than a month later, not much else is known about the man who was a model of health and fitness before his life was cut short on the quiet Boone County highway.
Friends from his gym family at Snap Fitness in Hebron, just down the road from the accident scene, say he was a regular there since he joined in 2013, but started coming in overnight when he switched jobs.
“For the past six months, consistently, he would come in the early morning hours between 2:30 and 3:30 a.m., said Jennifer Schneider, an employee of Snap Fitness. “We’re pretty sure he was actually on his way to the gym that night. He had his Snap Fitness card on him.”
Snap Fitness is open 24 hours a day for members who can scan the card to gain entry to the facility.
Snap Fitness owner Chanin Roszkowski said Williams routinely came in at about 9:30 a.m. before he changed jobs and rode his bike everywhere.
“He would wheel it to the back of the gym and store it,” Roszowski said. “He didn’t have any reflective gear.”
Williams’ body was found shortly before 7 a.m., but he was believed to have been struck some time between 2:30 and 3:30 a.m.
Roszkowski was teaching a class that Saturday morning and knew that a cyclist had gotten hit on KY 237, because her son-in-law texted her about it, but she never made the connection.
“Toward the end of class someone from the Sheriff’s office came in and told us he had a Snap card and showed us his picture and our hearts just sank,” she said.
At that point, investigators were looking for any information that might shed light on what has been termed a hit-and-run investigation. Since Williams came in at odd hours and didn’t share much about his private life, his gym family didn’t have much to share.
Jennifer Schneider and Michael “Pete” Petrea, employees of Snap Fitness in Hebron, at the gym’s memorial dedicated to Allen Williams. Investigators are still looking for answers in the death of Williams, who was struck while riding his bicycle on KY 237 in August.
“The only thing I knew of him, before all of this happened, is that he was quiet, he was really humble, which was surprising because he was a really big, ripped guy,” Roszowski said. “He looked like a celebrity trainer or a military guy, but he was really nice.”
Roszowski did learn that Williams had been a fitness trainer at one time, but hadn’t done that work for about six years.
“I told him I would love to have him train for us, if he ever wanted to do it again, but he said he wasn’t really in that frame of mind right now,” Roszowski said. “You could tell he was a really deep person, because I would talk to him about things and he wouldn’t just throw things out. He was really thoughtful about what he would say.”
Michael “Pete” Petrea, of Hebron is a Snap Fitness employee who worked out with Williams before he changed his schedule.
“We would exchange conversations. I try not to spend too much time between sets, but I talk a lot. He always had a smile on his face and nothing but positive things would come out of his mouth,” Petrea said. “I was just thinking about him a month ago, wondering where he had gone. When we heard he had gotten hit, we looked up his times and saw he had switched his schedule.”
Williams, originally from Cincinnati, worked at several places in and around Hebron in recent years, including a Marriott hotel, Amazon, DHL and Galerie Au Chocolat, which is where he was employed at the time of his death.
Boone County Sheriff’s spokesman Tom Scheben said investigators have had a hard time moving the investigation forward. They were able to locate a significant other that Williams shared an apartment with, but the woman has been unable, or unwilling, to shed any light on the investigation.
Scheben said it is important to keep sharing the story because, even in the early morning hours, someone might have passed by the scene and saw something that appeared insignificant, but could be the key to solving the case.
That portion of North Bend Road is a mix of retail and industrial businesses and semis travel the corridor at all hours because of its proximity to Interstate 275. There was initial speculation that a tractor-trailer driver might have struck Williams without realizing it, but Schneider said investigators have shared that it was likely a passenger vehicle traveling about 40-miles-an-hour.
“The bike was pretty mangled up, so if it was a car, they would have known,” Schneider said. “They said it probably has hood damage, and headlight or passenger-side damage. Somebody out there knows something about what happened.”
Roszowski said Snap Fitness members have also tried to talk to the girlfriend, hoping she might be willing to tell them something she wouldn’t share with police, but have not had any luck.
“Everybody here has gone to great lengths to try to find out and members of the fitness center have even gone to the girlfriend’s apartment to try to get updates,” she said.
A few weeks ago, members of Snap Fitness found an appropriate way to honor the member of their gym family. A group of more than 20 staged a group benefit workout on a Saturday.
“There was only one person that came that didn’t come to the gym regularly and it was someone that he had trained previously,” Roszowski said. “She knew him back before we did, so I let her talk about him a little bit before we did the work out and she talked about how encouraging he was.”
It was a typical workout, but Roszowski added a challenging little “finisher” at the end.
“I had everyone get a sandbag, or a dumbbell, or something that was heavy, as kind of a burden, in honor of him,” she said. “We went around the building twice and at the very end, they had to do walking lunges with the weights, which they did not like to do, but it was a good way to remember him because he loved fitness.”
The fitness community is like a big family and Roszowski said when they asked for donations to help cover funeral expenses, members of Snap Fitness and Becca’s Gym in Covington, where Williams was also well known, contributed generously.
Roszowski said they have learned more about Williams since his death than when we was coming to the gym.
“Now that we know, I wish we would have gotten to know him so much better,” Roszowski said. “I heard from people that talked about how he used to go out dancing and they say he was like a big-brother type.”
Petrea said it’s unfortunate that it takes a tragedy to find out about someone in your community that was so special.
“We just got a glimpse of how awesome he was,” Petrea said. “He was a great person and he will be missed.”
Anyone who may have been traveling on that section of North Bend Road in the early morning hours of August 26, or who may have information about the accident, is asked to contact the Boone County Sheriff’s office at 859-334-2175.
Contact Mark Hansel at mark.hansel@nkytrib.com
OMG! I am heartbroken! Allen was my ex-boyfriend and I hadn’t spoken to him in about 8 years. He was a very good boyfriend, funny and would always cook for me. He was a great cook and he treated me so well.
He was still riding that bike everywhere. I will never get to talk to him again 🙁