One dead after car strikes crowd of pedestrians on Las Vegas Strip

CHRISTINA ALMEIDA

Wednesday, Sept. 21, 2005 | 10:19 a.m.

LAS VEGAS - A car plowed into a group of pedestrians along the crowded Las Vegas Strip on Wednesday, killing one person and injuring 13 others, authorities said.

The car jumped the curb about 5:15 p.m. and drove into pedestrians walking in front of the Bally's and Paris Las Vegas hotel-casinos, police and fire officials said.

The burgundy Buick then crashed into a nearby wall and came to a stop in a landscaped area in front of Bally's.

Stephen Ressa, 27, of Rialto, Calif., was arrested at the scene by an off-duty officer who was at a nearby restaurant when the crash occurred, authorities said. It wasn't clear if he was injured, and results of drug and alcohol tests were pending.

"We have not ruled out whether this was an intentional or unintentional act," Deputy Police Chief Greg McCurdy said.

The Las Vegas Strip was closed for hours in both directions as a dozen ambulances and scores of police officers and firefighters tended to the injured and interviewed witnesses.

A 52-year-old man died at University Medical Center, hospital spokeswoman Cheryl Persinger said. Eight other people, all adults from age 25 to 60, were being treated at the hospital. All were tourists from out of state. One was listed in critical condition, two in serious and the rest in fair or good condition.

Five people were taken to Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center, where one man was in critical condition, hospital spokeswoman Glenda McCartney said. Two women were in serious condition with broken bones, McCartney said. Two others were treated and released.

Ressa was being held at the Clark County jail with charges pending.

Police were investigating whether the badly damaged car, which had California license plates, had been stolen. Rialto Police Sgt. Jaime Estrada said the car's driver was believed to have been involved in a recent incident there. He had no other information.

Along the Strip, thousands of onlookers lined police tape that stretched hundreds of feet.

Lynette Farmer, 33, of Woodstock, Ga., walked by the scene after seeing the chaos from her hotel room at Paris Las Vegas.

"We didn't hear the crash," she said. "But we saw people lying on the sidewalk."

Farmer's husband, Andy, said the couple had been down the same stretch of the Strip about an hour before the crash and saw cars speeding by large groups of people on the sidewalks.

"The speed on this road is just too fast," said Farmer, a 34-year-old police officer in Canton, Ga.

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Associated Press Writer Ken Ritter contributed to this report.