2 Killed in Separate Traffic Accidents

An elderly woman and a teenage girl were killed in separate car accidents late Sunday and early Monday in Anaheim, officials said.

The first crash occurred shortly after 11 p.m. Sunday on the Riverside Freeway west of the Costa Mesa Freeway, when an Anaheim teen lost control of her car, ran off the roadway and hit a tree, the California Highway Patrol said.

Xelba Fox, 17, died at the scene. Her car absorbed most of the crash impact on the driver’s side, CHP spokeswoman Karen Bowen said. Officials suspect Fox was driving at a high rate of speed, Bowen said.

The second accident occurred about nine hours later when a 74-year-old woman apparently ran a red light on Crescent Avenue, east of Dale Street, police said. As Viola Koryta’s car crossed the intersection, it was hit on the driver’s side by another car.

The impact pushed Koryta’s car into a traffic signal pole at the northwest corner and sent the other car spinning into a pickup preparing to turn south onto Dale Street, police said.

Koryta, of Anaheim, was taken to Columbia West Medical Center, where she died of internal injuries. A passenger in her car, Claire Opett of Anaheim, suffered minor injuries and was in stable condition at UCI Medical Center.

The driver of the second car, Marcelo Cabrera, 23, was treated at Columbia West for minor injuries. He was traveling about 35 mph at the time of the crash, Anaheim Police Investigator Rick Alexander said.

The pickup’s driver, Robert Beaudreau, 44, was not injured, police said. Officials ask that anyone who saw the crash call the Anaheim Police Department’s Traffic Unit at (714) 765-1860.