PCH Crash Kills Russian Youth on First Day in U.S.

A Russian teen-ager who had been in the United States less than a day was killed in a five-car hit-run accident on Pacific Coast Highway in Santa Monica on Sunday, authorities said.

German Plotisa, 17, was a passenger in a Volvo that was struck by another car in a series of collisions at 5:38 p.m., the county coroner’s office said. The young visitor to Los Angeles was airlifted to Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead about an hour later.

Five other people suffered injuries in the accident, which closed PCH for more than five hours and snarled weekend traffic across the Westside, police said.

The accident was set off when a gray Chrysler minivan made a wide U-turn onto the southbound lanes in the 1100 block of PCH and was struck by another vehicle. An eyewitness told police that the gray minivan pulled over briefly and then sped away, Sgt. Harry Kutzbach said.

Authorities were trying to locate the driver of the minivan, he said.