Driver Flees After Striking Bayside Joggers; One Killed, Two Injured
Staff Report
Humboldt Sentinel
SECOND UPDATE: The memorial jog event was subsequently cancelled at the request of the family.
UPDATE: An event has been organized on Facebook to commemorate this tragedy, coming up this Saturday, Sept. 29 at 8 a.m. at Three Corners Market in Freshwater. According to organizer Melissa L Tafoya: “This is going to be an informal gathering of runners, joggers and walkers to honor the three women who were hit in this morning’s hit and run accident on Myrtle Avenue and to remind all of us to share the road.”
California Highway Patrol officers were dispatched around 5:45 a.m. this morning following a call of three joggers injured by a vehicle, one of them suffering major injuries.
Deputy Coroner Ariel Gruenthal indicated later this morning that one individual was killed. Two others were transported to the hospital with serious trauma following the hit-and-run traffic accident on Myrtle Avenue. The name of the woman killed in the accident and pronounced deceased at the scene has yet to be released, pending notification of her next of kin. All three joggers involved in the accident were female.
The two women brought to St. Joseph Hospital with possibly compound fractures and other injuries were Eureka residents Jessica Hunt, 41, and Terri Vroman-Little, 50, according to the California Highway Patrol.
The three joggers were running northbound on the west shoulder of Myrtle Avenue, south of Ole Hansen Road, at about 5:40 a.m. when a 2005 Kia Spectra driven by an unidentified suspect hit all three women, the CHP said. For unknown reasons the vehicle left its lane of travel and struck all three of the female joggers. A dog belonging to one of the joggers was also killed.
The driver of the vehicle fled the scene. The vehicle was later found abandoned by the Eureka Police Department on California Street, in Eureka. Myrtle Avenue was closed between 3 Corners Market and Indianola Road for four hours following the accident.
Several possible leads are being followed up on as to the identity of the hit and run driver. The accident– and locating the missing driver– remain under investigation, the CHP said.
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KIEM-TV has their video report here.
The Times-Standard News has been posting updates here.
Readers will want to see our updated Sentinel article regarding the possible connection between this incident and the deceased woman found by the CHP in Hoopa hours later, taken from a timeline of the CHP incident log.
(Posted by Skippy Massey)
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[...] The TRT is indicating this is a suspected homicide following discovery of the victim by a relative. They say it may– or may not– be connected to the Bayside/Myrtle Avenue fatal hit and run that happened earlier this morning. [...]
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