Driver in Crash Was ‘Trying to Get Away’ : Deaths: In a pretrial hearing, a man accused of killing two students during a police chase says in taped interview he was afraid of returning to jail.

A Palmdale man accused of causing a crash that killed two teen-agers when his pickup truck ran a red light during a police chase later told investigators he “was just trying to get away. I was scared. I didn’t want to go back to jail,” according to court testimony Tuesday.

Ray Vargas Servin, 22, also said he knew he was endangering others when he led police on the chase, which ended when he crashed into another vehicle at Chatsworth Drive and Laurel Canyon Boulevard. Such knowledge is required for prosecutors to prove Servin guilty of second-degree murder under the theory that he acted with wanton disregard for human life, Deputy Dist. Atty. Shellie Samuels said.

Servin made the statements during a taped police interview about four hours after the June 1 crash, in which Aracely Hernandez, 18, of San Fernando and Uriel Fernandez, 16, of Pacoima were killed. A third occupant in the victims’ car, Juan Melendrez, 16, suffered minor injuries.

The three students were on their way home from a high school football game when their car was struck broadside by Servin’s truck. Fernandez was a star pitcher for the San Fernando High School baseball team. Hernandez was a cheerleader and a member of the softball team at Sylmar High School.

The truck was being chased by a San Fernando police officer who saw the vehicle near an area where two or three gunshots had been fired. Servin later told police he fired the shots in the air to scare off another man who pointed a sawed-off shotgun in his direction during a fight at a gathering in San Fernando.

He said he tried to flee because he didn’t want to return to prison after recently completing two sentences for robbery and joy-riding convictions, Samuels said.

After the crash, Servin ran off and hid in some bushes before being discovered by police and arrested, Samuels said.

During the interview, Servin told detectives he had drunk more than three six-packs of beer in the five hours before the crash. A .38-caliber revolver with three spent shells was found under the dashboard of his truck.

In addition to facing two counts of second-degree murder, Servin is charged with causing death while evading police, Samuels said. If convicted, Servin faces a maximum sentence of 38 years in prison, Samuels said.

The tape of the June 2 interview was played in Van Nuys Superior Court Tuesday during pretrial proceedings to determine whether it and other evidence could be admitted in trial. Judge James M. Coleman ruled that most of the tape was.

Servin wept quietly while a videotape depicting the accident scene and the dead bodies was played in court. After his arrest, Servin told police: “I did care for those people that I hit.”