Florida College mourns student killed in wreck

Jolee Tarrant (photo via www.floridacollege.edu)

Florida College, a 500-student college associated with Churches of Christ, is mourning the death of one of its sophomores — 19-year-old Jolee Tarrant.
The college plans a memorial service for Tarrant at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 10, on its campus in Temple Terrace, Fla., a suburb of Tampa.
Tarrant died in a Jan. 4 wreck in Zephyrhills, about 21 miles northeast of Temple Terrace. She and a friend, 20-year-old Hayley Mann, were out for afternoon tea, the Tampa Bay Times reports:

But on their way to a shop, Mann ran a red light at the intersection of Chancey Road and County Road 54 in Zephyrhills, the Florida Highway Patrol said. Her 2003 Toyota Echo was hit by a tow truck hauling a Jeep SUV.
Mann was taken to Tampa General Hospital in serious condition. The truck driver was not injured.
Tarrant died at the scene.
“She was very bubbly, very energetic,” said her mother, Sharon Tarrant, who found out about her daughter’s death Wednesday night. The family is in California. Jolee Tarrant came to the Tampa Bay area to attend Florida College, a private Christian university in Temple Terrace. That is where she and Mann met each other and lived together on campus in 2010. Mann didn’t attend school there this fall, but Jolee Tarrant continued. She was a sophomore and had been living with Mann and her family in Temple Terrace during their Christmas break.
Sharon Tarrant said her daughter wanted to be a photojournalist and was a self-assured, confident young woman.

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Family and friends of Tarrant and Mann are raising funds so that Tarrant’s parents can attend the memorial, the Temple Terrace Patch reports.
Florida College’s website asks people to “pray for (Tarrant’s) family, others involved in the accident and the Florida College community as we cope with this tragedy.”
 

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  Our prayers & thoughts for Tarrant family and Florida College during this time of loss.

  Katrina Billingsley

  January, 12 2012