LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Authorities have released the names of two people who died in separate crashes last week.
The Lake County Sheriff’s Office said Richard Orvis Evens, 63, Kelseyville died in a vehicle crash on Big Valley Road in Kelseyville and Thalia Inez Ugaz, 23, Stockton was hit and killed by a vehicle while crossing Highway 29 in Nice on Friday, Jan. 23.
The two crashes occurred two hours apart.
At 5:25 p.m. Jan. 23, the California Highway Patrol’s Ukiah Dispatch Center broadcast a call of a solo vehicle crash on Big Valley Road east of Renfro Drive, the CHP reported.
Responding units determined Evens was driving a gray Honda CR-V west on Big Valley Road when, for unknown reasons, he failed to negotiate the curve of the roadway.
The CHP said Evens drove the Honda off the road and the front of the Honda crashed into a ditch south of Big Valley Road.
The Honda cartwheeled multiple times and came to rest on its wheels south of Big Valley Road and east of Renfro Drive facing an easterly direction, the CHP said.
The CHP said preliminary evidence suggests Evens was not wearing a seatbelt during the crash.
He was pronounced dead at the scene, the CHP said.
The CHP said Friday that it remains unknown if drugs and/or alcohol were factors in the crash.
Just two hours after the Evens crash, the CHP responded to a call for a pedestrian hit by a vehicle on Highway 20, west of Howard Avenue in Nice.
Ugaz was found lying in the roadway, unresponsive. A CHP officer administered aid by Ugaz died of her injuries at the scene, the CHP said.
The CHP said the preliminary investigation showed that Ugaz was crossing Highway 20 from south to north, within a crosswalk at Howard Avenue, when she was hit by a gray 2012 Honda Ridgeline being driven westbound on Highway 20 by Brannon Keller, 64, of Clearlake.
Keller was not under the influence of drugs or alcohol and was released from the scene, while the CHP said it was not yet known if Ugaz was under the influence of any substance when the crash occurred.
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