Families Seeks Answers After Crash Hospitalizes 3 Cousins In Camden Co.

VOORHEES, NJ — A crash hospitalized three cousins on Labor Day weekend in Voorhees. Their families believe they were struck by a driver who was fleeing police in a high-speed chase.

Zachary MacBride was driving his cousins — Jibril and Nadia Rouag — when a vehicle struck MacBride's Honda Civic on the night of Aug. 31 on Haddonfield-Berlin Road, according to the attorneys representing the cousins' families.

MacBride, 18, is a first-year college student and a volunteer firefighter in Medford, his hometown. Jibril, 21, and Nadia, 18, were visiting from San Francisco with their parents to comfort their ailing grandmother during the holiday weekend. Before the crash, the cousins spent the afternoon fishing.

The collision hospitalized all three, with Nadia still in treatment for a brain injury, according to their legal team.

Nearly a month after the crash, law enforcement has offered little information, says Elizabeth A. Bailey, one of the families' attorneys.

"We've been actually getting more information from sort of boots-on-the-ground discussion with nearby businesses and kind of keeping an eye on what's being posted in local Facebook groups from witnesses," Bailey told Patch.

A crash report from police says the cousins were among six people injured in a four-vehicle collision. But many of the details, including the entire crash description, have been redacted.

Authorities have not told the victims' families whether the crash stemmed from a police chase, Bailey said.

Court documents state that a Voorhees police officer tried to stop a stolen vehicle, according to 6abc Action News. The driver — Rhafik Ghazal, of Cherry Hill — sped away from the scene and ran a red light at Haddonfield-Berlin Road and White Horse Road, causing the crash, the news outlet reports.

The circumstances around the crash are under review, according to a spokesperson for the Camden County Prosecutor's Office. But the agency declined to release additional information at this juncture.

At this point, the cousins' families say they want more information on why police allegedly initiated the chase in a high-density, residential area.

"We're looking to see what comes out of this investigation and what we find," Bailey said. "We're not going to rush to judgment or rush to decisions until we have all the facts on the table."

In late 2021, the state began prohibiting police from initiating pursuits solely because a vehicle was stolen. State Attorney General Matthew Platkin implemented the policy because high-speed police chases endanger officers and innocent civilians.

He reversed the policy months later, following feedback from police and an increase in stolen vehicles across New Jersey. But before a pursuit, officers still must weigh whether the need for an immediate arrest outweighs the risks posed by a chase.