KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A 16-year-old driver who sped away from a traffic stop in a stolen vehicle was killed along with two passengers after fleeing from a traffic stop last week, Kansas City police said.
Police said in a news release that the teen initially stopped for police last Tuesday but drove off after an officer got out of his vehicle. Seven others were packed into the Kia Soul, a subcompact crossover sport utility vehicle that had been reported stolen earlier in the month.
Police said the officer didn't follow the teen, who crashed into a Chevy Tahoe as its driver slowed to turn left. The impact spun the Tahoe around, and the Soul crashed into a utility pole before flipping onto its roof.
The 16-year-old driver, Donnelle Morris, and the front passenger, 37-year-old Reginald Smith, were pronounced dead at the scene, while a second passenger, Myesha Gentry, was pronounced dead at a hospital. The other five people inside the Soul, four of them children, sustained serious but non-life threatening injuries, police said.
KMBC reports a man in the second-row right passenger seat was holding a 4-year-old on his lap. A 6-year-old child was in the second-row middle passenger seat. In the rear cargo area were a 12-year-old and a 13-year-old.
Police said the Tahoe's driver also was taken to a hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
