Car Fleeing Police Crashes Into Bedroom

The residents of Haas Avenue in Hawthorne have intimate experience with car crashes. Too intimate.

Take Mark Barnes, for example. A year and a half ago, a car barreled into the front of his neighbor’s house, close to his own bedroom, so he moved his bed to another wall.

That shift may have saved his life early Monday when a car flew around the sharp curve in the 11200 block of Haas Avenue and rammed through his bedroom wall, inches from where he and his wife were sleeping. Neither was injured but both were reminded of the traffic dangers that residents have complained about for decades.

In the 34 years he has lived on the block, there have been nearly 30 serious accidents because of the curve, Barnes said. He and neighbors say that they have repeatedly asked the city of Hawthorne and Los Angeles County for stop signs, speed bumps and concrete pillars or to make the street a dead-end. But to no avail.

Monday’s crash resulted from a high-speed police chase and marks the second such chase that ended in a crash into houses there in two years. The car bounced off the same neighboring house that was hit in 1998.

Los Angeles County Department of Public Works spokeswoman Donna Guyovich said the county conducted a study of the street more than 10 years ago and concluded that extra traffic controls were not necessary. She said the county has not done a study since and has not received any complaints about a high number of accidents.

Residents hope that Monday’s crash will lead to another study.

Haas Avenue residents say that the neighborhood is usually quiet and family-oriented, but that drivers looking for a speedy shortcut between Western Avenue and Imperial Highway take the street because there is only one stop sign between the two big thoroughfares. “People come down this hill at high rates of speed, and they wipe out all the time,” said Barnes, 39.

His wife Tara Barnes, 37, described Monday’s crash as being “like an explosion, and these car lights are in your face.”

Wall beams were pushed forward and a gaping hole was left into the side yard. Plaster, broken glass and wood chips covered the room. The couple said they had no idea how much repairs might cost.

After the accident, the family was herded into the garage by police who believed the car’s occupants might be armed.

Hawthorne police arrested the driver of the car, 18-year-old Allen Kelvin of Inglewood, on suspicion of grand theft auto, receiving stolen goods and evading police, all felony charges.

Officers took Kelvin to Robert F. Kennedy Hospital to be treated for minor injuries. He was released to police custody several hours later. Witnesses reported seeing a second man flee the vehicle, but police were unable to find him.

According to police, the pursuit began before midnight Sunday in the area of 120th Street and Crenshaw Boulevard. Speeds reached more than 90 mph as police followed the car onto the Century Freeway and then off at the Vermont Avenue exit.

Most of the trees lining the west side of the street were taken out years ago by cars unfamiliar with Haas’ sharp curve, said Mark Barnes.

Tara Barnes said the family parks its cars in back at night so they won’t get hit. During the day, they park them out front to protect their 6-year-old daughter when she plays out front. “We’d rather they hit the cars than the children,” she said.

Barnes’ neighbor Fannie Thomas, 42, whose house also was hit Monday (and twice in the past, before she owned it), said initially she didn’t believe neighbors’ warnings that the street was dangerous. Now, after a year of living there, she believes.

Paula Hooks, 38, recalled how her family’s home nearly burned down in 1986 after the fire hydrant on the street was hit by a driver and not replaced. Several months later, when the house caught fire, the Fire Department had to connect hoses to a hydrant blocks away.