Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Teenage pedestrians blindsided by car in North Las Vegas; 1 dead

Updated Tuesday, Jan. 9, 2018 | 6:50 p.m.

A driver veered off the road Tuesday afternoon, mowing down two teenage boys, killing one of them and seriously injuring the other, according to city police.

The 14-year-old students may have been walking from nearby Legacy High School during the 2 p.m. crash, which was reported near Centennial Parkway and Fifth Street, said Officer Eric Leavitt, North Las Vegas police spokesman.

A maroon sedan was southbound on Fifth, just north of Centennial, when its driver, a 21-year-old man, veered off the road, crossed all wrong-way lanes and struck the boys, who were walking on the gravel that serves as sidewalks in that part of town, Leavitt said.

The boys may have not seen the car coming, as they were engaging in “the right thing to do” by walking against traffic as authorities recommend, Leavitt said.

Both victims were rushed to a hospital in critical condition, where one died and the other has been upgraded to serious condition, Leavitt said.

Early in the probe, there was no “obvious” cause for the crash, and investigators remained at the scene about 6 p.m., Leavitt said. “We don’t know if it was speed, if it was the weather (as ‘constant rain’ was falling at the time of the crash) or a medical episode.”

Investigators have ruled out impairment, but a detailed investigation should determine exactly what happened, Leavitt said.

Further details were not immediately available.