A member of the US Navy is facing drunk driving and vehicular manslaughter charges after the pickup truck he was driving plunged off a San Diego bridge, killing four people and injuring nine at a festival below.
Richard Anthony Sepolio, 25, who was stationed at the naval base on Coronado Island across the bay from San Diego, was alone in the truck on Saturday afternoon when he lost control and fell 18m onto a vendor’s booth at Chicano Park, California Highway Patrol Officer Jake Sanchez said.
Sepolio remained hospitalized on Sunday with serious injuries. His rank or job description was not immediately available.
Photo: AP
“It’s horrible. It’s horrific. We had innocent people down here having a good time and now they’re gone,” Sanchez said after the crash.
The people who were killed were Cruz Elias Contreras, 52, and Annamarie Contreras, 50, of Chandler, Arizona; and Andre Christopher Banks, 49, and Francine Denise Jimenez, 46, both from Hacienda Heights, a suburb east of Los Angeles, the San Diego County Medical Examiner said.
Witnesses had said four people in the booth were crushed by the truck.
Eight people on the ground were injured. One sustained major trauma, while seven had minor to moderate injuries, said Lee Swanson, a spokesman for the city’s Fire-Rescue Department.
Witnesses said that the GMC pickup truck with Texas license plates landed on a vendor’s booth set up for La Raza Run, a motorcycle ride that begins in downtown Los Angeles and ends with a celebration at the park.
The crash took place steps away from a stage where a rockabilly band was playing.
On Sunday, mourners gathered at the park to lay flowers and candles and say prayers for those killed.
Tina Camarillo told the San Diego Union-Tribune that she and her daughter were in a booth next to the one that was hit.
“To see such tragedy in an instant...” she said.
“The truck “fell and all I saw was darkness, the glass blew, the canopy fell on my head. My daughter was running to get my mom. It was horrible,” Camarillo said.
Iris Jimenez, 29, told the newspaper that she got out of the way just in time.
“I saw the truck coming at me and if I hadn’t run, I’d be dead,” Jimenez told the newspaper.
Her companion, Pedro Sanchez, was one of several men who rushed to lift the pickup off the people it hit, she said.
Photographs from the scene showed the truck’s front end crumpled and its hood popped open.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in