Monday, July 26, 2004 | 10:55 a.m.
Seven people, including a baby, her 8-year-old sister, and a taxi passenger, died in four separate accidents on Las Vegas Valley streets during a particularly deadly weekend here, police said.
An eighth person, a 64-year-old Las Vegas man, also died in connection with a car crash Saturday. But police said they were not sure whether a medical emergency or the crash caused the death.
In the other deadly accidents police said speed, disobeying traffic laws, and not having the baby in a car seat played a role in either the accidents or their severity.
The 7-month-old girl, Damarus Monge, was sitting in a passenger's lap and was crushed between that person and a seat belt that was around both of them, Metro Police Detective Corey Moon said. Her 8-year-old sister, Cynthia Sanchez, also died in that Saturday accident on Nellis Boulevard near Charleston Boulevard.
"When you hold a baby in your lap the baby just becomes a cushion for you, like an air bag," Metro Sgt. Frank Weigand said.
Erin Breen, the director of the Safe Community Partnership Program at the Transportation Research Center of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, said, "having a child in your lap is the single most dangerous way to have a child in the car."
But there are also a myriad other ways for traffic deaths to occur, as illustrated by the other cases in the valley over the weekend.
Early Sunday, three people died in a hit-and-run related accident. The hit-and-run led to a car chase that ended when the vehicle being chased collided with a third vehicle, killing both drivers and a passenger, police said.
Weigand said that drivers should not chase others, and instead should "just get a license plate number and let us handle this."
Another 14 people -- including two children and three teenagers -- were injured in the weekend crashes, but none of those injuries were serious, police said. Two of the deadly accidents, the one involving the alleged hit and run and the one near Kyle Canyon Road, both happened around 2 a.m. Sunday.
"Seven people died in 24 hours; it's pretty sad," Weigand said during an interview just hours before a deadly crash next to the Rio took another life.
In that Sunday night collision, a front-seat passenger in a cab died during the accident in which the cab allegedly ran a stop sign, struck another car, and then hit a light pole and parking garage wall, Weigand said.
Weigand said usually there are one or two deadly vehicle accidents each weekend here, and there's no specific reason why so many deadly accidents happened this weekend.
"There's nothing to pin these accidents on. There was some poor driving, possibly a medical problem, and others driving irresponsibly," Weigand said. "You just can't put your finger on it. Like this weekend, it's just fate."
Breen said she couldn't remember the last time there were so many deadly accidents in a weekend here.
"I was absolutely stunned the entire weekend," Breen said. "It's just unbelievable. Every time I turned on the news it got worse."
Breen said she was frustrated because she thinks the deadly collisions were preventable.
"When you look at the things that happened this weekend people are doing what they've been told over and over not to do," Breen said. Except for "the man with the possible medical problem these were all preventable," she said.
Overall, there had been 140 traffic deaths in Clark County this year through Sunday night, which is up from 127 at the same time last year.
Just in Metro's jurisdiction, there have been 78 traffic deaths this year. In all of 2003, Metro had 126 traffic deaths.
Statewide, 217 people have died in traffic accidents this year, while 198 had died by this time last year.
The details available from authorities this morning regarding the weekend traffic deaths were as follows:
They were in a 1998 Nissan heading north on Nellis when the driver, Gicela Salgado-Ramirez, 28, of Las Vegas, lost control of the Nissan, which started spinning and then went across the median and into oncoming traffic, police said.
The Nissan then collided with a pickup truck that was being driven by John Kimbrough, 53, of Las Vegas, and was heading north.
The two children were pronounced dead at the scene of the accident. Both drivers and the passengers in the Nissan, Luz Monge, 31, of Las Vegas, and children ages 10 and 12, suffered minor injuries. They were all wearing their seat belts, Moon said, adding that Monge was the mother of all the children.
But in front of the cab was a car stopped at a stop sign, so the cab went around that car and into the street, Weigand said.
"The three passengers were telling him to slow down he was driving like an idiot," Weigand said.
The cab collided with an Acura Integra, which sent the cab into a light pole and the side of a parking garage.
The passenger in the front seat, Stuart Paul Stanze, 51, of Eureka, Mo., died. The cab driver, Goran Kopic, 36, of Las Vegas, two other passengers, Carol Stanze, 51, of St. Louis, and Patricia Alexander, 56, of Arnold, Mo. received minor injuries. The two people in the Acura, driver Paul Snider, 19, and Blaine Lewis, 18, both of Las Vegas, also suffered minor injuries in the accident.
At the intersection of Swenson and Tropicana, the Ford Explorer ran a red light and collided with a white Mitsubishi Montero that had two women in it. The crash sent the Montero spinning into a traffic light pole.
The two women, driver Delfina D. Bonilla, 33, of North Las Vegas, and Maria Iniguez, 62, of Las Vegas, died in the crash, as did the driver of the Explorer, whose vehicle overturned. Weigand said the Explorer was going as fast as 70 mph when the two vehicles collided. The name of the driver of the Explorer was not released pending notification of family.
The two women were wearing seat belts. The driver of the Explorer was not wearing a seat belt, but Weigand said he couldn't tell whether a seat belt would have prevented his death.
The car that was chasing the Explorer had minor damage from the accident at Flamingo and Swenson, but was not hit in the deadly collision, Weigand said. He said the driver of that car, whose name was not released, could face reckless driving charges.
The group, in a 1995 Isuzu Rodeo, was heading north on Sky Point Drive when the vehicle went off the road. The driver overcorrected and the vehicle rolled over, throwing the driver from the Isuzu and killing him.
Those injured in the crash were identified as Las Vegas residents: Clayton Claflin, 24; Jacquies Hampton, 19; Kyle Dandy, 17; and Michael Harris, 17.
Police said speed was a factor in the crash.
Then the car hit the curb and rolled onto its roof.
Police said Bishop may have had a medical emergency that caused the crash. The exact cause of his death will be determined by the Clark County Coroner's Office.
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