COLERAIN – A 15-year-old child was tragically killed here Sunday afternoon after he fell from the bed of a pick-up truck.

Raheim Reid of 226 Thompson Road, Colerain was pronounced dead at Roanoke-Chowan Hospital in Ahoskie following the incident, one reported shortly after 1 p.m.

North Carolina State Highway Patrol Trooper Chris Godwin said Reid was riding, with two other young males (ages 16 and 14) in the bed of a 1989 Ford pick-up truck. That vehicle, driven by 24-year-old William Devon Watford of Cremo Road, Colerain, was traveling south on NC 45, approximately 80 feet from the Colerain town limits, at the time of the mishap.

Trooper Godwin said the driver and the victim were cousins.

“There were no contributing circumstances as to why this young man fell out of the back of the pick-up truck,” Godwin said.

No charges were filed against Watford.

Godwin did verify there was a state law prohibiting riders in the bed area of a pick-up truck. However, that law applies to those under the age of 12 unless they are accompanied by an adult.

The fatality was the 12th of the year within the NC Highway Patrol’s Troop A, District II area (Bertie, Gates and Hertford counties). Of those, four have occurred in Bertie County.