3 Young People Die in Crash Tied to Alcohol

One passenger was a promising college athlete. Next to him was a young rap singer with his own band. Up front in the ’66 Mustang sat an 18-year-old woman who was set to graduate today from community college and had dreamed of traveling to Africa.

Those dreams were shattered Thursday when the Mustang’s 17-year-old driver--who investigators suspect was drunk--tried to beat a yellow light on the way home and collided with a big-rig truck, police said.

The crash killed the athlete and the rap singer, both 20, and rescuers had to cut them from the wreckage. The community college student died Thursday night at the hospital without regaining consciousness, according to the coroner’s office.

Greg Hopkins, the stepfather of 20-year-old passenger Stephen Lord, stood at the crash scene Thursday afternoon trying to comprehend what had happened at the intersection hours earlier in the darkness.

“One minute you have a laughing, breathing person,” said Hopkins, recalling his stepson. “Then the next, he’s gone.”

The accident occurred at 12:20 a.m. at Jamboree Road and Main Street after the foursome had been enjoying an evening of dancing, police and relatives said.

The 17-year-old driver, whose name is being withheld because of her age, was treated for minor injuries and taken into custody on suspicion of drunk driving.

Detectives are investigating conflicting reports of who might have run a red light and caused the crash.

Police said the 17-year-old reported that she was trying to get through a yellow light and contends that it was the truck driver who ran a red light, while the big-rig driver said he had a green light.

“We have one driver saying one thing and the other driver another thing,” Irvine Police Lt. Tom Hume. “We still don’t have any witnesses and are asking anyone who saw the collision to contact our traffic bureau.”

Police said that no alcohol was found in the Mustang and that the 17-year-old driver was later released to her parents. Police are trying to determine who might have provided alcohol to her.

Truck driver Floyd Lephart, of Durango, Col., was alone in the big rig, which did not have a trailer. Lephart was unharmed, so paramedics called to the scene focused their attention on the three victims inside the crumpled Mustang.

Leon Green, a freshman basketball player at Irvine Valley College who lived in Long Beach, was pronounced dead at the scene.

Stephen Lord, who lived in Laguna Beach and sang in Dial 7, an alternative rock band, died at 3:10 a.m. at Western Medical Center-Santa Ana, about the same time his family arrived.

Cody Thorne, 18, of Laguna Beach died Thursday night at Western Medical Center.

“She was a hard worker and a smart girl,” said Greg Thorne, her father, blinking back tears earlier in the day.

A former Laguna Beach High School student, Thorne left high school at 16, earned an general equivalency diploma and enrolled in Saddleback College. ‘She got bored with high school,” her father said.

The teenager concentrated her studies in anthropology, landed on the dean’s honor list at both Saddleback and Irvine Valley College, and was set to graduate from Saddleback today.

Thorne had been accepted to UC Santa Barbara and planned to enroll in August, her father said. She had hoped to later study abroad in South Africa to pursue her interest in anthropology.

“She loved adventure, people and animals,” Greg Thorne said.

Her father recalled the last time he talked to his daughter: She called Wednesday after completing her last final exam, and said she was going to celebrate by going dancing at the Sensations club in Irvine. She said she was going with the 17-year-old, whom he described as an acquaintance.

“I didn’t know any of the other passengers,” Greg Thorne said.

Other relatives and friends of the victims also said they were unsure of the relationships between the four young people in the car.

But there was one apparent link: Each was acquainted with someone involved with Lord’s band, relatives said.

Lord grew up in the Turtle Rock area in Irvine, graduating from University High School. He moved to an artist colony along Laguna Canyon Road about six months ago and joined his brother, Michael, in the group Dial 7.

He loved to write music and sing. His mother, Betty Hopkins, 44, said he was constantly caught between his desire to make money and his love for music, which didn’t earn him much money.

“He was always struggling with priorities,” said Hopkins, a legal transcriber whose office overlooks the scene of the accident. “He was like a tumbleweed, always searching. Always searching.”

But in between the struggles, one thing remained constant: his family. Lord called his mother often and usually ended the conversation with “I love you.”

“He just knew how to bring out the positive in everything,” said Melissa Mieves, his girlfriend for about nine months. He had a lot going for him, you know?”

Lord had met the 17-year-old driver through the girl’s sister, who is “very close” to the band, friends said.

The 17-year-old driver had left high school as a sophomore but later completed her California High School Proficiency Exam, school officials.

The fourth passenger in the car was Leon Green, who started this past season as a reserve for the Irvine Valley College men’s basketball team but later became a starter.

Irvine Valley Coach Jerry Hernandez said the 5-foot-11 point guard “really understood what it took to run a team. He was just a competitor. He wanted to win. We could be playing badminton and, I’ll tell you what, Leon would win.”

Hernandez said the team has lost its emotional leader, its “quarterback.” Although Green was not a starter this season, Hernandez said he had potential to be a starter next season.

“He loved to compete,” Hernandez said. “He was early to practice every day because he wanted to learn.

For the mother of one victim, there was no hurry to assign blame to the teen driver.

“I feel nothing but sorrow for her,” said Betty Hopkins, Lord’s mother. “She’s got to live through this. She’s going to need a lot of help and a lot of love.”

Investigators asked that anyone with information about the crash call Irvine police at (714) 724-7024.

Times staff writers Steve Kresal and David Reyes contributed to this report.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Accident Victims

Drunk driving is suspected in fatal encounter.

Leon Green, 20-year-old college basketball player from Long Beach

Killed

Stephen Lord, 20-year-old musician from Laguna Beach

Killed

Cody Thorne, 18-year-old graduating community college student from Laguna Beach

Declared brain-dead

Red-light run kills two