Two dead in crash with man charged with DWI
Sheriff’s office: Victims, both 26 and of Texas, killed Thursday in head-on collision with man driving on wrong side of road
A road trip to Pagosa Springs, Colo., turned deadly near Santa Fe late Thursday night for two young men from Texas.
Jordan Dwyer and Landon Crossley, both 26, died in a head-on crash on U.S. 84/285 just north of the city. Two men riding with them were hospitalized with injuries.
Scott Sullivan, 51, of Topanga, Calif., who police allege was driving drunk on the wrong side of the roadway before the collision near Tesuque, faces charges of driving while intoxicated and reckless driving, as well as two counts each of homicide by vehicle and great bodily harm by vehicle, the Santa Fe County Sheriff ’s Office said in a news release Friday.
Crossley’s father said in an interview his son and Dwyer were close friends traveling through the area with two other men on their way to Pagosa Springs to ski.
Dwyer and Crossley were “best of friends,” Simon Crossley, said. They had attended junior high and high school together in Texas, and both went to the University of Oklahoma, he added.
“These were great guys,” said Dwyer’s father, John Dwyer. “It’s devastating.”
Jordan Dywer was the driver and Landon Crossley a backseat passenger in a Dodge Ram pickup headed north on U.S. 84/285 when Sullivan, driving a Jeep, struck them head-on, the sheriff ’s office said.
Sullivan had been driving south in the inside northbound lane of the highway, according to the agency’s news release.
Deputies were dispatched to the area shortly before 11 p.m. Thursday after receiving a call about a wrong-way driver, the news release says. About one minute later, Santa Fe emergency dispatchers received a call reporting the head-on crash.
Sullivan was taken to Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center for treatment of his injuries.
Sheriff ’s office spokeswoman Denise Womack-Avila said he was still being treated in the hospital Friday but would eventually be booked into the Santa Fe County jail.
The state’s online court database did not yet show charges had been formally filed against him late Friday.
The two surviving passengers in the Dodge Ram also were taken to Christus St. Vincent, the news release says.