Hit-Run Pileup Fatally Injures Woman On I-15 In Sabre Springs

SAN DIEGO, CA — A chain-reaction series of crashes involving three vehicles killed a 55-year-old woman on Interstate 15 in Sabre Springs Thursday and left a suspected hit-and-run driver badly injured and under arrest.

The pileup occurred shortly before 2 a.m. when a 30-year-old man lost control of the Ford pickup he was driving on the northbound side of the freeway near state Route 56, according to the California Highway Patrol.

The pickup collided with a Toyota sedan and skidded to a halt in the roadway, then was struck by a Kia sedan, CHP public-affairs Officer Sal Castro said.

At that point, the man behind the wheel of the pickup jumped out of his damaged vehicle and ran off.

Paramedics took the driver of the Toyota, a Chula Vista resident, to a trauma center, where she was pronounced dead.

The 51-year-old Desert Hot Springs man who had been driving the Kia was transported to a hospital for treatment of minor injuries.

San Diego police eventually found the man who had abandoned the pickup on the freeway. He was lying unconscious in a nearby neighborhood, according to the CHP. He was hospitalized with severe injuries, Castro said.

The names of the suspected hit-and-run driver and the other motorists involved in the wreck were not immediately available.

— City News Service