15-Year-Old Walking Along PCH Is Killed by Hit-and-Run Driver

A 15-year-old Newport Beach youth who had stormed out his house after an argument with his mother early Thursday died after a hit-and-run driver struck him, the California Highway Patrol reported.

Samsun Phan was walking south along Pacific Coast Highway wearing headphones and listening to his personal stereo about 1:35 a.m., CHP Officer J.C. Rivas said.

A witness told CHP investigators that a red compact car “came flying down” the southbound lanes of Pacific Coast Highway just as Phan stepped slightly into the right-hand lane, Rivas said.

The car hit Phan, made a U-turn and fled the scene, officials said.

The witness was driving north on the highway near El Morro Elementary School and Crystal Cove State Park when she saw and passed Phan, made a U-turn and saw the other car hit him, Rivas said.

Phan was taken to Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian in Newport Beach, where he died at 3:45 a.m.

Officers are unsure how long Phan had been walking, but he was about five miles south of the Newport Beach city limits, Rivas said.

“He was probably just thinking about what had occurred, listening to [his stereo], walking along” when he was struck, she said.

Officers recovered a driver’s-side rearview mirror knocked off in the collision and used that to identify the hit-and-run car as a 1989-1990 Nissan Sentra model XE or GXE, Rivas said.

The car would have sustained severe windshield and front-end damage, so investigators asked that repair shops be on the lookout for a vehicle needing that type of work.

Anyone with information about the crash is asked to call the CHP at (949) 487-4000.