Delaware woman receives kidney of father killed in accident

PHILADELPHIA -- There's been an odd, but very poignant twist to the story of a deadly pedestrian accident Friday night in Delaware.

It turns out that a man who died in the accident was an organ donor - and one of his kidneys has been transplanted into his daughter.

60-year-old Anthony Jenkins had offered to donate a kidney to his daughter, Stacey Knox, but couldn't because of a previous heart attack.

Knox has battled diabetes since she was a little girl.

Last year, after her kidneys failed, she went onto the transplant list.

Her father wanted to help.

"He'd always say I'd give my life for your life," Stacey told Action News.

But Jenkins couldn't be a donor because of his own health.

Friday night, while visiting his brother in Bear, Delaware, Jenkins accidentally stepped into the path of a car.

"I got a beat at my door at 1:00 a.m., saying my dad had been hit by a car, and he wasn't doing well," recalls Stacey.

She was told to get to Christiana Hospital right away.

There, she learned one side of her dad's brain was injured so badly it couldn't recover.

But Stacey couldn't have dreamed of what happened next.

A representative of the Gift of Life donor agency met with Stacey, not knowing she needed a kidney.

As she told the representative that her dad wanted to be an organ donor, she also mentioned she was on the transplant list.

There was no guarantee he would be a match.

But he was.

Not only did their blood types match, so did the tissue.

Stacey got that news on a phone call where she also learned she only had three hours to get from Lewes, Delaware to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania - in Sunday afternoon traffic coming back from the Delaware beaches.

She says local police declined to help her get through the backups.

However, Stacey made it to the hospital and, on Monday morning, she received her father's kidney.

And the gift didn't stop there.

"Someone else got the other kidney and his liver," she said.

Someday Stacey hopes to meet the other recipients, to tell them what a funny, loving, guy-who-could fix anything her dad was.

As she recovers at the hospital, handmade cards from a 7-year-old niece help Stacey through this tough time.

She misses her father, but knows he is at peace.

"I know my dad is proud and happy that he was able to give me a second chance, a life again," she told us.

Stacey says if you want to be an organ donor, be sure it's on your driver's license or ID card.

Anthony Jenkins spoke of it, but never got his license changed.