Highway Patrol works three fatals last weekend

By By William F. West / community editor
Sept. 17, 2002
QUITMAN The Mississippi Highway Patrol is continuing to investigate a one-vehicle wreck on Highway 145 that left a Waynesboro teen-ager dead.
Staff Sgt. Ronnie Carter, a spokesman for the Highway Patrol, said that Jonathan B. Morris, 19, died after the car he was riding in wrecked just north of the Quitman town limits at 11:31 p.m. Friday.
Carter said the 1996 Honda was driven north by Blair Griffin, 17, of County Road 31 in the Rose Hill community. Carter said he understood that Griffin was not hospitalized.
The Highway Patrol also worked two other wrecks in East Mississippi last week.
One happened at 2:10 a.m. Friday on Highway 15 about five miles south of Bay Springs resulting in several injuries and the death of Laurel resident Rufiu Evangelista.
Carter said Evangelista was a passenger in a 1995 Chevrolet driven by Lino Rico, 24, also of Laurel.
Also in Rico's vehicle were Gildardo Munoz, Lisa Daro Castillo, Juan Mendozia and Jose Antonio Castillo, Carter said. He said two other unknown people were in Rico's vehicle.
Rico's vehicle was heading southbound on Highway 15. A second vehicle involved in the accident, a 1993 Ford driven by Humberto Mendez of Laurel, also was heading south.
Carter had no other details on the accident.
At 6:32 a.m. Saturday, Highway Patrol officers responded to a one-vehicle accident on Interstate 20 west in Scott County that left two people dead about a mile west of Morton.
Carter said the names of the victims would not be released pending notification of next of kin. But he said the car, a Ford, had California license plates.