Crash investigation continues
Officials seek toxicology tests from driver involved in collision that killed Saugus mother
Investigators probing a head-on traffic collision Friday which claimed the life of a 37-year-old Saugus mother of six are waiting for the results of toxicology tests to determine if alcohol was a factor in the fatal crash.
Katie Snyder Evans was killed Friday night in a two-vehicle collision that happened shortly before midnight on Golden Valley Road near Valley Center Road.
The driver of the other vehicle, identified only as a 22-year-old woman, was driving on Golden Valley Road when she hit a curb, lost control of her vehicle then sideswiped another vehicle.
The 22-year-old suspect ended up veering onto oncoming traffic.
“She sideswiped one car and then hit the other one head-on,” said Sgt. Dan Dantice with the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station. “They found alcohol containers in the vehicle.”
Alcohol is suspected to have been a factor in the crash, Shirley Miller, spokeswoman for the SCV Sheriff’s Station, told The Signal Monday.
Paramedics with the Los Angeles County Fire Department were dispatched to the crash at 11:48 p.m. Friday, Fire Department Supervisor Melanie Flores said.
“One person was taken to the hospital,” she said.
Evans was pronounced dead at the scene.
Kelly Yagerlener, an investigator with the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, said Evans died of blunt trauma.
No arrests have been made in the case which is now being investigated by a detective with the SCV Sheriff’s Station Traffic Section.
“The (22-year-old) driver has not been arrested,” Miller said Monday.
“We are now waiting for the results of toxicology tests to come back,” she said.
“If the tests show alcohol, she will be facing vehicular manslaughter charges,” Miller said.
At the time of the fatal crash, Evans was about a mile from her home, returning from a visit with her premature twins in the hospital, according to Natalie Mortensen who set a fundraising page for the Evans family online.
Evans couldn’t go a day without visiting her new twins at the hospital, according to Mortensen.
Evans was devoted to her family and passionately concerned about issues that affected her family.
In June, Evans shared some of her concerns about health care on social media, and specifically, about the challenge families face paying for medical costs.
Facing a high-risk pregnancy, Evans asked other moms with a similar experience what the final bill for their babies was knowing she was looking at a C-section and multi-week stay in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit for her babies. The general consensus? Sky high.
Now Evans leaves behind her husband, Jacob, and her children - Spencer, 12, Travis, 11, Nathaniel, 9, Gideon, 2, and twin girls Hannah and Sarah almost eight weeks old.
In her effort to raise money for the family, Mortensen writes: “Jacob is left to care for six kids by himself.
“There will be many childcare costs as well as unforeseen expenses. We know many would like to help but don’t know how to, or are too far away to help in person. If you would like to donate towards childcare and other expenses. You could make Jacob’s life a little easier.
Since the crash, more than $175,000 has been raised in honor of the Evans family.