SAN DIEGO (CNS) - Authorities Thursday publicly identified seven people fatally injured over the last several weeks in San Diego-area traffic crashes.
The most recent of the deadly accidents claimed the life of a 67-year- old San Bernardino County man last Saturday, according to the county Medical Examiner's Office. Bernard Nietvelt of Redlands was struck by a tractor-trailer at about 10:15 a.m. after crashing a motorcycle on state Route 78 east of San Felipe Road in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, the agency reported. Nietvelt died at the scene.
Two days earlier, a predawn hit-and-run killed a pedestrian in his hometown of Oceanside. At about 4:45 a.m. on April 16, a westbound 2005 Toyota Tacoma struck Gregory Means, 76, on Mission Avenue, just east of Mesa Drive, according to police and the medical examiner. Following the deadly impact, the motorist continued driving and left the area. Means died before paramedics could take him to a hospital.
On the morning of April 12, Raphael Garcia Ramirez, 21, was behind the wheel of an SUV that crashed into a wall in a commercial parking lot in the 7700 block of University Avenue in La Mesa, the county agency reported. An ambulance crew took him to Sharp Memorial Hospital in San Diego, where he was pronounced shortly after 9 a.m. that day.
The previous day, a motorist was killed in a fiery freeway crash near Sweetwater Reservoir. Shortly after 3:30 p.m. on April 11, Christopher Diego, 32, was driving an eastbound Subaru WRX that veered out of a traffic lane on state Route 54 east of SR-125 in Spring Valley, struck a tow truck parked alongside the roadway and became engulfed in flames, according to the medical examiner and California Highway Patrol. Diego died at the site of the wreck.
Roughly 13 hours earlier, a 25-year-old motorcyclist was killed in a solo freeway crash in his northern San Diego-area hometown. Michael Hatzioannou of San Marcos was heading west on SR-78 when the two-wheeler he was riding veered off the roadway west of Woodland Parkway and struck a portable message sign, the county agency reported. Hatzioannou died at the site of the accident.
On April 10, Cresencio Molano Canseco, 57, was hit by a car in the 600 block of Douglas Drive in Oceanside, according to the medical examiner. Molano Canseco, a resident of the northern San Diego-area coastal city, died at the scene.
Two days earlier, another Oceanside traffic crash fatally injured a 23- year-old man. Terence Sautia of Vista was riding a motorcycle that veered off the roadway on North Avenue at Autumn Drive and struck a concrete pillar at about 4:45 p.m. on April 8, the county agency reported. Paramedics took Sautia to Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla, where he succumbed to his injuries nine days later.
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