On February 9, 1993, something terrible happened on Highway 30 near Cedar Rapids, Iowa that left people shocked and confused. Jarold Allgood, a 21-year-old student at Kirkwood Community College, died after being hit by a semi-truck in the early morning. At first, everyone thought he had killed himself on purpose. But later, people found out it was something completely different.
Jarold was a good student who had lots of friends and enjoyed his life. He played basketball, baseball, and football in high school and was really good at football. When he died, he had never shown any signs of being sad or depressed. He did not drink alcohol or use drugs. As per the Fandom, the doctors checked his body after he died and found nothing in his system. Even with all this, the police first thought he had ended his own life.
People driving on the highway that freezing February morning saw something very strange. A young man wearing only boxer shorts was running barefoot on the icy road. He was moving fast and seemed to know where he was going. The college student had gotten out of bed with his eyes open and ran nearly a mile while asleep. He weaved through parked cars and turned corners perfectly before running straight into a semi-truck on Highway 30. He died right away.
The truth behind what really happened
Jarold’s mother, Becky Allgood, knew something was not right about the suicide idea. She started asking questions and talking to people who knew her son. She talked to his roommate and learned some important things. Jarold had told his roommate about a dream he kept having over and over. In the dream, he was running a race with a man who was driving a car.
His roommate also remembered something else that happened not long before Jarold died. One night, Jarold came out of his bedroom, said the apartment was too dark, turned on some lights, and went back to bed. The next morning, he did not remember doing any of it.
Everything started to make sense to Becky. Jarold had walked in his sleep since he was a little kid. His two brothers, Jason and Aaron, did the same thing. Becky had told many doctors about this problem over the years, but all of them said it was nothing to worry about. The sleepwalking continued when Jarold was a teenager and even when he went to college. While sleepwalking may seem harmless in fiction, real-life cases can have devastating consequences.
Becky worked with sleep doctors, including Dr. Mark Dyken from the University of Iowa, to prove that sleepwalking killed her son. She worked hard to get the death certificate changed. Finally, sleepwalking was listed as the real reason Jarold died. This was the first time in Iowa that someone’s death was blamed on sleepwalking. The story got a lot of attention around the country and was shown on Unsolved Mysteries in November 1996 and on another show called Medical Mysteries.
After her son died, Becky decided to help other people learn about sleep problems. She went on talk shows, including The Oprah Winfrey Show, and worked with sleep doctors who wrote about Jarold’s case in medical books and papers. Since then, scientists have learned that sleepwalking happens to a lot more people than they thought.
About 3.6 percent of adults in America, which is around 8.4 million people, walk in their sleep every year. Most kids who sleepwalk stop doing it when they become teenagers. But for some adults, sleepwalking can be dangerous. Some people eat food from the fridge while sleeping. Others even drive cars without really waking up.
