Driver Going ‘Extremely Fast’ on Freeway is the Sole Fatality in Fiery 5-Car Pile-Up

A 23-year-old Beverly Hills man was killed after his speeding car struck a center divider on the San Diego Freeway in a spectacular crash that triggered a five-car pile-up and closed the southbound lanes for nearly two hours Saturday morning, the California Highway Patrol said.

“We figure he was going 80-plus (m.p.h.), probably closer to 90,” said CHP Officer Lyle Whitten.

The man, identified by the Orange County coroner’s office as Arthur J. Bautista, was driving just south of the Springdale Street exit in a Subaru coupe about 6 a.m. when he sideswiped a Mitsubishi Mirage driven by Lisa Toumajian, 19, of Hermosa Beach, Whitten said.

Both drivers lost control, and the Subaru veered to the left and slammed into the center divider just north of the Garden Grove Freeway.

“He was going at such a rate of speed that he rolled up onto the center divider wall, went airborne and hit an 18-inch-diameter freeway signpost, head-on, about 10 feet above ground level,” Whitten said. “He was going extremely fast. . . . The car almost wrapped its way around the post.”

Bautista apparently was killed instantly, a spokesman for the coroner’s office said.

Seconds later, Whitten said, the Subaru slid down into the car pool lane and exploded in flames.

A passing motorist, Brandon Newcomb, 29, of Buena Park, stopped, saw that Bautista was still inside, and pulled him from the burning car, Whitten said.

As Newcomb was carrying Bautista away from the fiery wreck, a van drove up, swerved to avoid Newcomb, but struck the burning Subaru, Whitten said. The family in the van was not injured, he said.

Next, a Ford pickup drove up behind them. That motorist managed to avoid hitting the burning wreck and the van, but failed to see Toumajian’s Mitsubishi, which had skidded 200 feet down the freeway and was stopped in a middle lane, Whitten said.

“He hit her broadside,” Whitten said. “Then his pickup overturned.”

The pickup was sliding down the freeway on its side when it was struck by a fifth car, a Toyota van. Neither of the drivers was injured.

Times staff writer James M. Gomez contributed to this story.