Drive off cliff looks deliberate: patrol officer

SEATTLE — Investigators said Monday they were examining “red flags” in a Washington state family’s past in hopes of explaining why their SUV went off a 30-metre cliff in what might have been an intentional plunge.

The wreck was discovered last week on rocks along the coast near Mendocino, California, a few days after child welfare authorities in Washington began investigating whether the children were being abused or neglected.

The Hart family’s two mothers and three of the six adopted children were found dead; the three others are missing and presumed dead, possibly washed out to sea.

Police said Monday that social service authorities in Oregon contacted the West Linn Police Department about the family in 2013 while they were living in the area.

The questions were referred to the Oregon Department of Human Services, which cited privacy laws in refusing to comment.

Sarah Hart pleaded guilty in 2011 to a domestic assault charge in Minnesota over what she said was a spanking given to one of her children.

Last month, concerned neighbours in Woodland, Washington, contacted child-welfare authorities, saying the children might have been going hungry.

On Sunday, authorities announced that data from the vehicle’s software suggested the crash was deliberate.

The SUV had stopped at a pulloff area and then sped straight off the cliff, Capt. Greg Baarts of the California Highway Patrol said. Baarts said investigators have not found a suicide note.

In interviews with friends and relatives, “there have been red flags,” the investigator said. He did not elaborate.