Lancaster Man Dies as Car Ends Up in Creek
A 21-year-old Lancaster man was killed when the car he was driving plunged over an embankment and landed upside down in Bouquet Creek near Santa Clarita, authorities said Sunday.
The victim was identified as Benedict J. Parsons, California Highway Patrol Officer David Pokorny said. He said four passengers in the vehicle, including the driver’s 16-year-old sister, escaped injury.
The accident occurred at 10:35 p.m. Saturday on Bouquet Canyon Road, about five miles north of Texas Canyon Road. Pokorny said Parsons was driving southbound at a high rate of speed when he lost control of his 1983 Honda Prelude on a curve. The car skidded across a dirt shoulder and plunged into the creek.
The passengers escaped from the overturned vehicle and ran to a nearby house to summon help, but authorities pronounced the driver dead at the scene, Pokorny said. Los Angeles County coroner’s supervisor Dean Sebree said an autopsy will be conducted today to determine whether Parsons died of drowning or an injury.
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