Modesto Man, 46, Killed In Chaotic Ceres Crash
CERES (CBS13) — A chaotic single-vehicle crash scene in Ceres left one man dead on Sunday.
Ceres police say, just before 1 p.m., officers responded to the northbound Highway 99 off-ramp at Whitmore Avenue for a reported crash. At the scene, officers found a grisly scene where a driver's leg was trapped in the door of a wrecked pickup truck.
Officers immediately started life-saving measures and tried to open the door, but it wouldn't budge.
The driver, 46-year-old Modesto resident Leodegario Mendez Gonzalez, was soon pronounced dead at the scene by medics.
Investigators now believe that Gonzalez was originally in the drive-thru of a KFC nearby. For some reason, he tried to step out of the vehicle - but that's when the pickup started rolling forward.
Gonzalez jumped back into the pickup, but it then crashed into the corner of the KFC. The pickup then accelerated out of the drive-thru and crashed into a curb that separated the restaurant parking lot from the off-ramp.
The pickup didn't stop, however. It continued onto the off-ramp going the wrong way, then started backing off the ramp before coming to a quick stop - then reversing, again, onto the off-ramp.
Police say the pickup didn't stop until it crashed into the wall separating the on and off-ramps.
Investigators are still looking into what caused the crash. It's unclear if drugs or alcohol were factors, Ceres police say.
