A man was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence after he slammed his car head-on into a group of motorcycle riders celebrating their club’s 10th anniversary, killing four motorcyclists and his companion, authorities said on Sunday.
Authorities are also looking for another driver who they say played a central role in the crash.
Carlos Ramirez Bobadilla, 36, was arrested when officers smelled alcohol on his breath about five hours after the Saturday crash, California Highway Patrol officer DeeAnn Goudie said.
Ramirez, one of six injured in the collision on a remote desert highway, was recovering from hand fractures at a San Diego hospital, Goudie said.
It was unclear if the driver’s alleged alcohol consumption contributed to the collision, Goudie said, but he was arrested on a misdemeanor and is not being held responsible for the deaths based on evidence collected so far. Results of a blood test were pending and not expected for about two weeks, she said.
Authorities were looking for the driver of a gold Honda Civic with California license plates who forced Ramirez off the road when trying to pass the motorcyclists on the undivided two-lane highway east of San Diego. Goudie said she planned to check surveillance video at a nearby border crossing to see if the driver went to Mexico.
Ramirez, of Mexicali, Mexico, swerved his white Dodge Avenger to the right shoulder to avoid the Honda and then overcompensated by swinging left into oncoming traffic, Goudie said. Ramirez’s speedometer was found stuck at 105kph, 8kph below the speed limit.
“It would have been nice if he had just gone off to the right,” Goudie said. “He would have been stuck in the soft sand.”
None of the motorcyclists got the license plate number of the Honda driver — described as a man wearing a baseball cap. No one pursued him, choosing to stay behind to attend to their friends.
“I was the first person on scene that had a uniform on,” Goudie said. “I was being dragged in every direction by frantic people saying, ‘Help this person, help that person.’”
The California Highway Patrol withheld names of the five who died, pending notification of next of kin. They included a husband and wife who were on a motorcycle that was first to be struck.
A man who was driving a motorcycle behind the couple was struck next and died, Goudie said.
Ramirez turned and hit a third motorcycle, killing a woman who was riding on the back and injuring her husband, Wilson Trayer, 39, Goudie said.
Trayer’s motorcycle sliced 45.72cm into the front passenger door of the Dodge that Ramirez was driving, killing Ramirez’s companion, a 31-year-old Mexicali woman who owned the car, Goudie said.
Carl Smith, president of the Lakeside-based Saddletramps Motorcycle Club, said three riders were seriously injured, but were expected to survive. Two others had less serious injuries.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
IN PURSUIT: Israel’s defense minister said the revenge attacks by Israeli settlers would make it difficult for security forces to find those responsible for the 14-year-old’s death Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday condemned the “heinous murder” of an Israeli teenager in the occupied West Bank as attacks on Palestinian villages intensified following news of his death. After Benjamin Achimeir, 14, was reported missing near Ramallah on Friday, hundreds of Jewish settlers backed by Israeli forces raided nearby Palestinian villages, torching vehicles and homes, leaving at least one villager dead and dozens wounded. The attacks escalated in several villages on Saturday after Achimeir’s body was found near the Malachi Hashalom outpost. Agence France-Presse correspondents saw smoke rising from burned houses and fields. Mayor Amin Abu Alyah, of the