One of the people killed in a fatal crash in Tehama County last Monday was a young runaway teenage girl from Elk Grove, according to the Corning Observer. At 4:25PM Monday afternoon 13-year-old Emily Henz was a passenger in a Honda Civic driven by 26-year-old Daniel Bruno, also from Elk Grove. The car was traveling very fast southbound on Paskenta Road just south of Rancho Tehama Road when Bruno lost control on a curve. The Honda skidded sideways into the northbound side of the road into the path of a Ford E-250 utility van. The van broadsided the Honda, nearly splitting it in half and killing Bruno and Henz. After the crash, the unknown driver of the van was seen by witnesses getting out and leaving in a white Honda coupe driven by someone else. He may have been injured. CHP investigators are seeking any information anyone may have to identify the van driver. The Honda occupied by Bruno and Henz had apparently been stolen from Rancho Tehama just minutes earlier.
The two fatalities were among 4 last week on Tehama County roads. Last Sunday shortly after Midnight a 22-year-old man from Chico crashed near Lake California in Cottonwood in a Subaru Crosstrek. The SUV was approaching the guardshack of the gated community when it went off the right side of the road for unknown reasons, struck a tree and caught fire. The driver was unable to get out of the burning vehicle and he died at the scene.
The fourth fatality was last Tuesday on Highway 36 east of Red Bluff. The Tehama County Coroner’s Office said the single vehicle crash claimed the life of 40-year-old Phillip Wheeler of Redding.