Wrentham man, a father of three, dies in hit-and-run

WRENTHAM -- Jeffrey Cardin walked into a pub Thursday night near the modest cottage where he lived alone and told a stranger he was suffering through the worst day of his life.

Cardin, 48, said he had recently buried his sister, recalled Suzanne Bourque, who sat beside him at the bar.

To compound his heartache, the twice-divorced father of three continued, he had just heard that his best friend had been diagnosed with cervical cancer.

"He kept saying that his children were the only thing that made him feel good," Bourque said yesterday.

When Cardin left the Anvil Pub for the short walk home, the day he described as the worst day of his life also became his last. About 200 yards from the pub, Cardin was struck and killed about 9:40 p.m. on Shears Street by an automobile that left the scene.

Yesterday, the family of a 17-year-old girl contacted Wrentham police to say that their daughter, after seeing news reports, recalled that she might have struck something in the vicinity of the accident, according to Detective Sergeant William McGrath.

Police did not identify the girl, who had not been charged by late yesterday afternoon. McGrath described her as cooperative.

"I think we're on the path to solving this thing," he said.

The detective said police had recovered bits of paint and pieces of the vehicle at the scene, where yellow markings showed where the car had skidded and Cardin had been struck.

Yesterday, Cardin's three children and his second wife, Rosemarie Walsh, grieved at her East Freetown home. "We're in shock," said Walsh, 45, mother of his two daughters, ages 17 and 12. "It's very surreal right now."

The family described Cardin, a man immersed in his Wampanoag heritage, as an avid, award-winning fisherman whose fun-loving, witty ways helped light up a room.

"Pretty much, if there was a saltwater pond here or anywhere in New England, he fished it," said his son, Jeffrey Michael, 23. "He'd take me hunting, he'd take me fishing, and we'd take trips with the girls down to Florida."

Cardin often attended Wampanoag pow-wows. "He taught us a lot about our heritage and our ancestry, and he just wanted to make sure that we respected the world like he did," Michael said.

Cardin grew up in East Taunton and attended Taunton High School, family members said. He was a truck driver for Hallsmith SYSCO Food Services before three hip replacements in the past 10 years forced him to retire, Walsh said.

Cardin's first wife, Ann Pirone of Arlington, mother of Michael, said: "I'm just grieving for my son who just lost his father. He's at an age where they could start to form a bond. He's starting to become an adult, and he doesn't have that now."

Cardin's son recalled his father's sense of humor. "He always joked around with his kids," Michael said.

He said his father sang karaoke at Orchid of Hawaii, a restaurant in Lakeville.

"Dad really had a presence," Michael said. "He was really able to light up a room. He could just be the center of attention. He had such a great sense of humor. He was able to make people laugh and make people feel at home."

One of Michael's most cherished memories was his father's gift to him on his 18th birthday.

"He gave me his most prized possession, which was a Carl Yastrzemski baseball, and it was signed," he said. "My grandfather gave it to him. And now that I was old enough, he'd given it to me, and he wanted me to hold on to it and give it to my son one day."

Cardin, one of 13 siblings, had lost at least four of his brothers and sisters. Family members said that a sister died within the past month, a brother died of leukemia about seven years ago, a twin brother died in the late 1970s, and a sister died as an infant.

On Thursday night, Cardin's world appeared to have closed in on him, Bourque recalled. She and Cardin walked in separately at 7:30 p.m., but sat beside each other at the bar and talked for an hour.

His friend's diagnosis of cancer had been a jolting, frightening shock, Bourque said. "He told me, 'I'm so scared for her.' He was very, very worried."

Bourque, who lives in Norfolk, said she tried to steer Cardin toward positive thoughts. " ' Tomorrow's another day, ' I kept saying to him," Bourque recalled.

And the conversation did contain some bright spots, she said, particularly when Cardin spoke about his son and daughters.

"The last thing he said to me was how much he loved his children," Bourque said.

For Cardin's son, the holidays are now a time of grief and bewilderment.

"It doesn't really feel like it's sunk in yet," Michael said. "We were all going to get together here on Christmas Eve."