Teens who died in police chase identified

• Police have released the names of the two Ontario teenagers who were killed when their car crashed head- on with a tractor- trailer while they were being pursued by police.

The driver was 15- yearold Nathan Wehrle of Cambridge who was too young to have a driver’s licence. His girlfriend of three weeks, Taryn Hewitt, 16, of London, was in the passenger’s seat.

“She was a good kid with a heart of gold and we all loved her very much,” Taryn’s cousin, Kelly Smith, told The London Free Press.

Friend Madison Kneel described Hewitt as “caring, outgoing, loving and funny.”

“It breaks my heart that I won’t be able to call her randomly anymore or have her send me random videos making me laugh when I don’t even feel like smiling,” she said.

Kneel said she didn’ t know Wehrle as well, but said, “I know he would do anything for the ones he cared about and always made sure his friends, and even people he didn’t know, were OK.”

Waterloo Regional police say they got a call at about 9:30 a.m. on Thursday from a citizen reporting the possible abduction of a woman, or assault on a woman, in Cambridge.

A Waterloo police officer located a vehicle linked to an assault on King Street East in Cambridge, or an abduction or both, and tried to stop it, the police said.

The driver didn’t stop, heading east on Highway 401 and travelling about 20 kilometres before turning south on Highway 6 toward Hamilton, according to police.

Waterloo police pursued the vehicle.

Just before 10 a.m ., the vehicle crashed head- on with a tractor- trailer on Highway 6, between Freelton Road and Concession 10, about seven kilometres south of the 401.

There is no median separating the north and south lanes, but there is a long, middle turn lane on that stretch that Wehrle might have crossed before colliding with the truck, police said.

The driver of the truck was not injured.

The Special Investigations Unit has been called in to investigate.

Speeding and reckless driving are taking the lives of too many teenagers, Kneel said in a Facebook post.

“I hope that after losing not one but two beautiful souls this week that teenagers get a huge wake-up call on to how dangerous it truly is,” she said.

Hewitt grew up in St. Thomas and attended St. Joseph’s Catholic high school there, according to her Facebook page.

Wehrle grew up in Cambridge.

The teens announced their relationship Sept. 17 on Facebook, and posted photographs of themselves as a couple.

Funeral arrangements for both families were private, obituary notices said.