Police identify truck driver in fatal crash with church van
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Version 0 of 1. Prince George’s County police and family on Tuesday identified the truck driver who crashed into a van full of church-goers Sunday as Medardo Flores, 30, of the county’s Hyattsville-Chillum area. Flores and three others died in the crash that also injured 13 congregants of a small church whose pastor and members spent Tuesday visiting and praying with survivors and their relatives and visiting the crash scene. [A pastor was waiting for 16 members to arrive. Then he got the horrific news.] Police said the fatal collision occurred as Flores was fleeing the scene of an earlier crash in which he had rear-ended a car. His truck caught fire after the first crash and slammed into the church van. A woman who identified herself as Flores’s wife declined to comment Tuesday beyond saying that her husband was among the dead and was the father of two children. County police on Tuesday also identified the others who died in the crash as Staily Gomez, 6; Santiago Merche, 75; and Elba Merche, 73. The injured included a pregnant woman who lost her baby. Authorities are continuing to investigate what caused the truck to crash into the first car. Detectives are also trying to determine whether passengers in the van were wearing seat belts and whether the children had been fastened into safety seats. Prince George’s officials said the crash was one of the most horrific in the county in recent memory, with many of the survivors critically injured and children as young as 6 months involved. Most were still in the hospital two days after the wreck, including the mother and the sister of the girl who died, according to church leaders from the Iglesia Ministerio de Dios Unidos. The girl had been identified Monday as Stanley Gomez rather than Staily. Members of the church had left Northwest Washington on Sunday afternoon to head to services in Maryland. As the van, carrying 16 people, was traveling along Chillum Road near the West Hyattsville Metro station about 5 p.m., the pickup crossed the double-yellow line and crashed into the oncoming vehicle. Mario Mendez, a friend of Flores’s, said that the two worked construction jobs together and that many of their co-workers were stunned by the news. “He had so many plans,” Mendez said. “One of those plans was to work hard, to push his family forward.” Flores, who was originally from Honduras, was already thinking about Christmas and what he could send home to his family, Mendez said. Sunday’s collision occurred about four miles from the Iglesia Ministerio de Dios Unidos on Kenilworth Avenue. As the crash erupted into an inferno, neighbors rushed to the scene and used fire extinguishers and garden hoses to douse flames as they pulled victims from the wreckage. About 60 emergency responders from Montgomery and Prince George’s and the District were needed to get victims to hospitals. The crash devastated the small congregation of about 45 people at the Iglesia Ministerio de Dios Unidos, many of them immigrants from El Salvador and Honduras. On Tuesday, church pastors visited the Merche family’s home in Northwest Washington. One of the Merches’ daughters, Hilda Merche, said her father had dreams of growing the congregation. He was supposed to meet with church leaders this week to discuss how the group could move out of the modest office space it shares with other congregations in Riverdale and find its own house of worship, she said. “They were really happy at the church,” said Hilda Merche, 52. “Every time there was a service, they were there.” Originally from El Salvador, the couple had been married for nearly 60 years. Their family had grown to include eight daughters, 34 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren, Hilda Merche said. “They had a happy and satisfied life,” she said. “They became a couple, and they stayed together forever.” Santiago and Elba, also known as Elba Linares, were always together as if “they were just one person,” Hilda Merche said. In some ways, she said, it made sense they died together. Jennifer Jenkins contributed to this report. |