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RALEIGH – Family and friends gathered for a private service Wednesday to remember the life of a good Samaritan killed after a wreck on the I-440 Beltline last week.

Police say 33-year-old Carroll Eames Jr., of Willow Springs, died after falling off a bridge into Crabtree Creek.

Eames' death brings back painful memories for a Wilson family who lost their son in the same spot four years ago as he tried to help others.

"Another good Samaritan falls to his death. It brings back a lot of sad memories, obviously,” Don Fletcher said.

He was devastated when he heard Eames died after falling from the same bridge as his son, Todd Fletcher, back in 2005.

"It's needless. Both deaths should have never happened. It's just an unsafe area,” he said.

Police say Eames was one of three people who pulled over to help after a wreck Friday evening on the Outer Beltline.

That's when several cars swerved to avoid the accident and went barreling toward the men. Police say Eames and the other two men jumped over the concrete barrier to avoid being hit. Two of them fell nearly 70 feet into Crabtree Creek, but Eames died in the fall.

After Fletcher's death, his family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the N.C. Department of Transportation. In 2007, the DOT spent more than $31,000 dollars to put up a fence on the side of the bridge where Fletcher fell, but not on the other side, where Eames jumped.

"When I go by there and see it I think, 'Why just half of it?' It's so narrow there you don't realize there's a drop,” Fletcher said.

Monday, the N.C. DOT announced they were launching an investigation into 17,000 bridges around the state similar to the one on the Beltline.

"At the time when we installed the other fence we thought it was going to fix the problem. We thought we had the solution. It was on the high side of the bridge, you couldn't see over it. On the lower side of the bridge, the gap was visible," Terry Gibson, with N.C. DOT, said at a news conference Monday.

But Fletcher's family says the investigation wasn't soon enough.

"It's too late for Mr. Eames and our family,” Fletcher said.

Fletcher says he plans to reach out to the Eames family.