Border agents hurt when suspected human smugglers crash SUV into vehicles
A suspected human smuggler driving an SUV carrying 11 passengers crashed into several vehicles, including a Border Patrol vehicle, in Jamul Tuesday night while it was being chased by Border Patrol agents.
Three people were sent to the hospital, and four agents suffered minor injuries and later sought medical care after the crash on westbound state Route 94 east of Otay Lakes Road, law enforcement authorities said.
The pursuit began around 9:30 p.m. when the driver of a Chevy Tahoe stopped briefly at a Border Patrol checkpoint on SR-94 and then took off. The driver briefly stopped again at Lyons Valley Road but as agents approached, the driver sped off, said Border Patrol spokesman Jeff Stephenson.
The driver pulled his SUV into the eastbound lanes of SR-94 to pass some traffic and then moved back into the westbound lanes east of Otay Lakes Road.
At that point, the vehicle sideswiped or rear-ended a 2007 Volvo, causing the Volvo to be pushed into a Subaru Impreza also driving west, said California Highway Patrol Officer Travis Garrow.
Garrow said the driver of the Volvo and two people in the Chevy Tahoe were injured and taken to a hospital to be treated. Four agents also sought medical treatment after the incident, Stephenson said. He said the Chevy SUV also struck a Border Patrol vehicle.
The freeway was closed for more than an hour while the damaged vehicles were removed.
Agents arrested the driver, a 23year-old man from Phoenix, and a passenger on suspicion of human smuggling, and detained 10 undocumented immigrants who had been riding in the SUV.
karen.kucher@sduniontribune.com
Man dies after vehicle hits his mobility scooter
CHULA VISTA
A man died Wednesday after a vehicle hit his mobility scooter while he crossed a street in Chula Vista, police said.
The crash happened about 10 a.m. on Oxford Street near Fourth Avenue when the vehicle, which was headed eastbound, struck the scooter. The impact threw the man onto the street.
A witness who called 911 told OnScene TV that the man landed under a parked vehicle. Medics started CPR on the man before taking him to a hospital, where he died, police said. His name and age were not released.
A stretch of Oxford Street was closed to traffic in both directions while officers investigated the crash.
david.hernandez@sduniontribune.com
CBP agents find 12K pounds of pot in papaya shipment
OTAY MESA
Customs and Border Protection officers found more than 12,000 pounds of cannabis, with an estimated street value of $27 million, mixed in with a shipment of papayas Monday at the Otay Mesa Port of Entry, law enforcement authorities said.
Officers discovered the illicit cargo around 5:45 Monday evening when an X-ray machine revealed anomalies in the trailer of a big rig, driven by a 50-year-old Mexican man, at a crossing area for commercial vehicles, Customs officials said in a statement.
A drug-sniffing dog then zeroed in on the cannabis, and a search of the trailer turned up 873 wrapped packages of cannabis mixed in with the fresh papayas, authorities said.
Customs officers seized the truck, trailer and cannabis and turned over the driver to immigration agents, officials said.
Within a span of four days last August at the same Otay Mesa commercial port of entry, Customs and Border Protection officers found 14,880 pounds of cannabis mixed in among boxes of limes in one big rig, and more than 2,150 pounds of methamphetamine mixed in among cactus pads in two other tractor-trailers.
alex.riggins@sduniontribune.com
Hit-and-run driver pleads guilty in cyclist’s death
SAN DIEGO
A motorist who fled the county after striking a bicyclist last sumthe mer in the Midtown area near Mission Hills — leading to the victim’s death just over a month later — pleaded guilty Wednesday in San Diego Superior Court to felony hit and run.
Mauricio Armando Flores, 29, faces four years in state prison for the Aug. 21 crash on West Washington Street near India Street that led to the death of 65-year-old Dan Mathewson Sweeney.
Though police did not publicly announce Sweeney’s death, testimony from Flores’ preliminary hearing late last year confirmed that the cyclist’s injuries proved fatal. He died Oct. 5 at University of California, San Diego, Medical Center, according to testimony and an obituary in the Coronado Times.
Flores is slated to be sentenced on March 24.
Police and prosecutors said Flores was driving a 2005 Dodge Caravan that struck the victim from behind, and that he fled to Central California without informing law enforcement of his involvement in the crash.
Video footage shot by a witness shows the driver of a van, which had Georgia license plates, pulling to a stop following the collision and getting out along with a female passenger. In the video, the pair are seen walking over to where Sweeney was lying on the side of the road.
After looking at him for a few moments, the driver pulled the bent bicycle out from under front of the van and set it aside, then got back into the vehicle along with his companion and drove off.
About one week after the crash, San Diego police posted Flores’ and his passenger’s names and photos online and asked for the public’s assistance in locating the suspects.
According to the California Highway Patrol, an off-duty Kern County CHP officer who had seen a flyer about the hit-and-run case came across the Caravan while riding his motorcycle in Lake Isabella, an unincorporated community about 35 miles northeast of Bakersfield.
Three days later, another CHP officer spotted the van — now bearing Vermont plates — in a parking lot outside a Vons store in Lake Isabella and called sheriff ’s deputies, who found Flores and his passenger and arrested them, CHP spokesman Robert Rodriguez said.
According to the Coronado Times obituary, Sweeney was a 1974 Coronado High School graduate described as a “kind and sensitive soul” by his sister, who said he helped anyone who needed it.
“Dan had friends from (Alcoholics Anonymous) who were homeless, and he would tell me about them,” his sister told the Coronado Times. “Dan saw the humanity and dignity in the marginalized and forgotten people. What a beautiful gift.”