2 Separate Fiery Crashes Kill 9 People In Murrieta Area Over Weekend

MURRIETA, CA — The Riverside County Sheriff-Coroner's Bureau was working to identify three people killed Saturday night in a fiery solo-vehicle crash at Alta Murrieta Elementary School, a sheriff's sergeant said Monday morning.

The crash deaths add to the weekend toll — nine — in Murrieta and its unincorporated area.

The vehicle crash was reported around 11:10 p.m. Saturday in the parking lot of the school at 39475 Whitewood Road, according to the Murrieta Police Department.

When officers arrived, they found the car fully engulfed in flames. One man was found severely injured outside of the car, and he was rushed to a hospital.

Officers and Murrieta Fire and Rescue personnel found three people, including the driver, inside the car after the fire was extinguished. All three were pronounced dead at the scene.

As of Monday morning, the coroner's bureau had not positively identified the three deceased, according to Riverside County Sheriff's Sgt. Ramirez.

Anyone with additional information regarding the crash was encouraged to contact investigator Kurt Stickelman at 951-461-6306.

A separate investigation continued Monday into the crash of a Cessna business jet near the French Valley Airport that killed all six people on board, the second fatal crash near the airport in four days.

The crash was reported at 4:15 a.m. Saturday near Auld and Briggs roads, the Riverside County Fire Department reported. Deputies found the aircraft fully engulfed in flames in a field. Six occupants were pronounced dead at the scene.

They were identified late Saturday by the Riverside County coroner's office as follows:
— Riese Lenders, 25, of Rancho Palos Verdes;
— Lindsey Gleiche, 31, of Huntington Beach;
— Manuel Vargas-Regalado, 32, of Temecula;
— Abigail Tellez-Vargas, 33, of Murrieta;
— Ibrahem Razick, 46, of Temecula;
— Alma Razick, 51, of Temecula.

According to Eliott Simpson of the National Transportation Safety Board, the person sitting in the pilot seat was a certified commercial pilot, though it wasn't specified which of the six victims that was.

The flight departed from Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, according to Federal Aviation Administration spokesperson Mina Kaji.

Shortly before the twin-jet plane was scheduled to land, a marine layer enveloped the area with low visibility, said Simpson.

"The pilot reported to air traffic control that he was going to perform a missed approach, which generally happens when a pilot can't see the runway," Simpson said at a Saturday evening news conference.

The Cessna Citation C550 business jet crashed about 500 feet short of the originally intended landing runway, and most of the plane, with the exception of the tail, was consumed by the fire.

Tellez-Vargas was a real estate agent, according to her Instagram profile, and Vargas-Regalado was her husband and a pilot. Lenders was also a pilot, according to his Instagram profile.
In an Instagram post, one of Lenders' friends with username @hanroeck said, "Riese, you were such a bright light in my life the last 12 years," adding, "I'll always think of you when I see an airplane up above."

A friend of Tellez-Vargas and Vargas-Regalado, Bre'Andrea Jones, uploaded a post on Instagram saying, "Some people, I don't know, I guess I expect them to live forever.

"My heart continues to ache with pain for the kids, I don't even want to believe that this unfortunate situation happened to y'all," Jones added.

Tellez-Vargas and Vargas-Regalado leave behind five children with the youngest being a one-year-old, according to Tellez-Vargas' Instagram profile.

The NTSB planned on spending possibly two days investigating at the scene along with representatives from the FAA and Cessna.

A preliminary report was expected in 14 business days, and a final report was expected in 12 to 18 months, Simpson said.

On July 4, a student pilot was killed and three other people were injured when a Cessna 172 crashed while departing the airport. That crash also remains under investigation.

—City News Service and Patch Editor Toni McAllister contributed to this report.