Man sought in 2015 fatal crash arrested

Ga. family of 3 was killed in rear-end collision on turnpike

Troopers arrested an Orlando man Tuesday after an exhaustive investigation into a 2015 crash on Florida’s Turnpike that killed a Georgia family.

Florida Highway Patrol troopers spent months reconstructing the moments leading up to the crash, officials said.

James Geoffrey Dameron, 26, who was found wearing an ankle monitor ordered after a previous drug-related arrest, was taken into custody by FHP troopers on the turnpike in Palm Beach County at about 4:50 p.m, said FHP spokeswoman Sgt. Kim Montes. The monitor was wrapped in copper and tin foil, an apparent attempt to tamper with it.

She said authorities received a tip Monday on Dameron’s whereabouts. On Tuesday, three troopers stationed themselves along the side of the turnpike, searching for a white Mercedes SUV, hoping to identify the suspect.

Dameron was driving the third white Mercedes SUV troopers intercepted. His half-brother, Joseph Kieran, 24, was a passenger, FHP officials said. Dameron tried to flee by taking a turnpike exit, but he ran into traffic and was pulled over and taken into custody, Montes said.

“When all these agencies come together, this is the cool part of being a cop,” she said. “When all these lawenforcement agencies come together to catch the bad guy.”

Montes said the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office and the FHP had been searching for Dameron since the collision that ended the lives of a young couple from Georgia and their baby daughter, who were on their way to Walt Disney World for the girl’s first birthday.

Dameron, who police say was driving on a suspended license in 2015, rear-ended Thomas Garza, his companion Lillian Luna and their daughter Brianna, causing both cars to flip, investigators said.

Garza, 23, and Luna, 20, died after their vehicle