Fleeing Vehicle Kills 5 at School : Tragedy: Four students and a parent die in Temecula after being hit by a vehicle chased by the Border Patrol.

A stolen Chevrolet Suburban fleeing from Border Patrol agents Tuesday crashed into a car and jumped a curb in front of a high school, killing five people.

Two of the dead were a brother and sister walking to school. The three other victims were a father, his son and his son’s friend, killed when the fleeing vehicle crashed into their car. Thirteen occupants of the fleeing vehicle were injured.

The accident occurred shortly after 7:30 a.m. in front of horrified students entering the Temecula Valley High School campus to begin the school day. It left wreckage and bodies strewn across a busy intersection in this growing, semi-rural community in southern Riverside County and renewed arguments about the Border Patrol’s policies on high-speed chases.

By evening, dozens of students returned quietly to the intersection, to leave wreaths, crosses and flowers.

The stolen Suburban carrying 13 suspected illegal immigrants ran a red light and smashed into a smaller vehicle with such force that it tore the car in half, killing the father, his son and a teen-age friend, and tossing the two halves 40 to 50 feet from each other, authorities said.

“There was metal and glass and rubber and people, all went up in the sky,” said Jason Boles, a driver who witnessed the crash. “There was notebook paper all over the place, so I knew there were kids involved. And I could see the dad in the front seat of the Acura with his suit on, and he was dead.”

The careening truck also struck and killed two students walking on the sidewalk: a brother and a sister whose mother is a reporter and who learned of their deaths as she was covering the accident for her newspaper.

“The kids were on the sidewalk just where they were supposed to be, and they got killed,” said Riverside County Sheriff’s Investigator Henry Sawicki.

Four of the illegal immigrants received serious injuries when the truck overturned and were hospitalized. The other nine were treated for minor injuries, then released to police for questioning.

Dead were Temecula banker John Davis, 46, driver of the car; his 17-year-old son, Todd Davis; a friend, 14-year-old student Monisa Emilio, and the brother and sister on the sidewalk, Gloria Murillo, 17, and Jose Murillo, 16. All of the teen-agers were students at the school; Todd Davis and Gloria Murillo were about to graduate.

The most seriously injured immigrants included an unidentified 17-year-old who was in critical condition with head injuries at Riverside General Hospital, along with 22-year-old Everett Pineda, who was in serious condition. Other injury victims were airlifted or driven to three other area hospitals. The driver, a juvenile, was identified only as an illegal immigrant who was treated for minor injuries.

Two passengers being treated at Sharp HealthCare hospital in Murrietta were Martin Morales, 26, in critical condition, and Andres Garcia Perez, 20, in guarded condition.

After the crash, students swarmed school pay phones and parents rushed to the school to check on their children.

As students arrived and saw the grim expanse of debris and bodies in the intersection, some became hysterical. Others vomited. Scattered fights broke out on campus as tensions built.

Students who were already inside were not allowed to leave, leading to mounting fear and rumors spreading about which of their friends had been victims.

“A lot of students were crying. No one knew who it was who was killed,” said senior John McCuster, 18. “Everyone was walking around with their heads down, in tears. It was just very depressing. People were in mourning.”

The accident revived a lingering controversy about Border Patrol chases in cities near Southern California freeway immigration checkpoints. Debate in the past had centered on the busy Interstate-5 checkpoint near San Clemente, where there have been several fatal accidents as a result of high-speed pursuits of illegal immigrants.

After Tuesday’s tragedy, some angry Temecula residents and officials questioned why the immigration agents pursued suspects into a residential area near a school.

“People are mad because they know immigration shouldn’t do this,” said student Jay Meredith, 17.

Consuelo de la Torre, mother of an 18-year-old student, said: “I don’t think they should say it’s only the fault of the driver. Its also the fault of immigration. Why are they driving so fast when they know there’s schools here? This tragedy should never have happened.”

Border Patrol officials said one of their marked vehicles began chasing the truck on the freeway from a point just north of the checkpoint. But they said the agents slowed down west of the intersection of Rancho Vista and Margarita roads, where the accident occurred.

The Border Patrol vehicle, which was pursuing the truck eastbound on Rancho Vista Road, “slowed its pursuit when its emergency siren and red lights failed,” said Gustavo de la Vina, chief of the San Diego Border Patrol sector. “The vehicle continued to follow the van at a quarter-mile distance.”

A preliminary investigation indicates that the pursuing agents acted properly, said De la Vina, who blamed the accident on the suspected alien smuggler driving the Suburban.

Sheriff’s detectives have not yet determined whether the Border Patrol was still engaged in a pursuit when the crash occurred or what charges will be filed, Sawicki said.

One eyewitness account said the Border Patrol vehicle appeared to slow down. Student Mike Madieros said: “The Border Patrol car stopped at the top (of the street) like he wanted them to know he stopped chasing them. The Border Patrol guy laid off . . . then came down (to the intersection) right after the crash.”

Another witness who was driving in the same direction as the Suburban said he did not see a Border Patrol vehicle arrive at the scene until several seconds after the accident.

The witness, who declined to be named, was driving east on Rancho Vista Road when the Suburban passed him on the left, crossing the center divide.

“I was going about 50, and he was probably going at least 80 or 90,” said the witness, who was about 200 yards from the intersection when the collision occurred.

The witness said he did not see a Border Patrol vehicle at any time before the accident or hear any sirens.

But a landscaper who was working nearby, Jose Guadalupe Alegria, said he heard a siren wail just before he heard the impact.

Border Patrol spokesman Earl Beasley said the pursuing agents had requested a backup unit, and that the second unit may have sounded its siren. He did not know the location of the second Border Patrol vehicle at the time of the crash.

The incident actually began more than 60 miles away near the U.S.-Mexican border in San Ysidro, when plainclothes immigration agents in an unmarked car saw suspected illegal immigrants climbing into the Suburban, officials said.

The plainclothes INS agents contacted the Border Patrol by radio and asked for a marked unit to help apprehend the Suburban in San Ysidro, said Border patrol spokesman Steve Kean. But no units were available, so the agents decided to follow the truck, unbeknown to its occupants, and intercept it with the help of agents at the Temecula checkpoint.

But the Suburban circumvented the checkpoint by exiting the freeway and re-entering the freeway just to the north, Kean said. INS agents lost sight of their quarry at that point, officials said, and they radioed the Border Patrol.

The actual chase began when a marked unit tried to pull over the suspected smuggler of illegal immigrants on the freeway. The Suburban then exited the freeway at Rancho California Road, attempted to lose the pursuing vehicle by entering a shopping center parking lot, then doubled back and headed in the direction of the school, Kean said.

One of the many parents who rushed to the school was the Murillos’ 36-year-old mother, who writes for a local Spanish-language shopping publication, El Remate.

Publisher Elia Esparza, Gloria Murillo’s cousin, said Murillo was nervous when she headed for the scene, although she knew nothing of her children’s deaths.

“She said it was a good thing that she was going to go down and report the story, because it would give her an excuse to go into the high school and get her kids out, “ he said.

Esparza also blasted the Border Patrol’s chase techniques.

“The Border Patrol is at fault,” she said. “They could stand outside our office in Temecula and catch all the illegals they want to. Why do they have to chase them?”

The other passengers, all described as illegal immigrants, were being held on grand theft auto charges in connection with the truck, authorities said. The suspected driver of the Suburban, who is believed to be from Mexico, also might face federal charges of smuggling illegal immigrants, Kean said.

The 1991 Suburban was stolen May 27 from the parking lot of the Mission Viejo Mall in Orange County, police said.

Contributing to this report were Kathy McDonald and Times staff writers Jonathan Gaw, Tom Gorman, Michael Granberry, Patrick McDonnell and Ray Tessler.

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Temecula Crash

1. Chevrolet Suburban, with 13 suspected illegal immigrants, exits Interstate 15 with Border Patrol agents following.

2. The Suburban, speeding east on Rancho Vista Road, enters the intersection of Margarita Road against the red light, hitting an Acura Legend southbound on Margarita, next to Temecula Valley High School.

3. The Acura splits in half and all three occupants are killed. The Suburban then veers out of control onto the sidewalk, killing two students and rolling over, injuring all of the occupants.