Two teens die, one charged in racing crash
Boys, both 15, killed in southwest Houston after losing control of SUV, striking tree; 14-year-old faces multiple felony charges
A 14-year-old Houston boy will face two felony charges after an early morning streetracing crash that killed two young friends.
They were teenage boys, joking around about whose car could go the fastest.
In minutes, two were dead and a third — just 14 years old — was facing criminal charges.
The teens were involved in a deadly crash after losing control during a drag race early Wednesday morning along Fuqua in southwest Houston. Grieving family members gathered about 7 a.m. in a nearby strip mall parking lot to watch over the scene.
“He wanted to be grown,” Rick Farley said Wednesday of his son, Seviyon, who was killed in the crash. “He didn’t want to listen to his momma. He didn’t want to listen to his stepdaddy. He didn’t want to listen to me.”
Farley said his son was a “good kid,” but had difficulty at school and home. He last spoke to him Monday, telling the teen to call him when he left school for the day. He was ready to file a runaway report with police when he got a call early Wednesday from the teen’s mother telling him about the crash.
Authorities have not identified the other teens. The 14-yearold who survived the crash will face two felony charges of hit and run and racing, causing death, police said.
“They were all good kids,” friend Leviyas Clayton said Wednesday morning as a tow truck driver prepared to depart with a mangled Ford Explorer. “They’re babies.”
The boys were racing in vehicles that belonged to their relatives. Clayton, 19, said he remembers his friends were talking at some point about whose car would win in a race. One of them was a newer car, which prompted the conversation, he said.
A Houston police officer saw the two SUVs — a Ford Expedition and a Ford Explorer — driving next to each other eastbound on Fuqua at high rates of speed just before 2 a.m. Wednesday, said Houston Police Lt. Larry Crowson.
The driver of the Expedition hit the Explorer, causing the second car to spin out near Bathurst, he said.
The Explorer struck a tree and overturned, Crowson said. The driver of the other car hit a traffic sign and stopped. He looked in the Explorer and then drove away, police said.
The two teenagers inside the Explorer died at the scene, Crowson said.
The police officer was unable to get to the speeding vehicles before the crash, Crowson said.
“The officer happened to be at the right place at the right time,” Crowson said early Wednesday. “Maybe (if) he’d been a little further down the street, maybe he could have got them stopped before they had an accident. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen tonight.”
Street-racing crashes have taken the lives of Houstonians before.
In April 2016, Baptist pastor Jesse Estrada and his wife, Maria Sabillon, crossed paths with street racers as they were returning home from the hospital after visiting a niece’s new baby.
A speeding truck racing a sports car ran a red light and slammed into Estrada and Sabillon’s car, killing them both, deputies said.
In January 2017, Alexis De La Rosa Sosa, 22, pleaded guilty to two counts of felony racing and two counts of failure to stop and render aid. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison for his part in the crash that killed the couple.
In Wednesday’s crash, all three teens were friends, Clayton said.
“We all brothers, we all came up with an oath to each other when we first met,” he said. “‘Ain’t none of us going to leave each other.’”
Clayton said he grew up with the other teen who died and was teaching him how to drive. He said he did not know he was racing.
“I’ve been looking out for him like he’s my little brother,” Clayton said.
Clayton and his friends stayed out at the crash scene for several hours.
“They’d do the same for us,” he said.