MIAMI – North Bay Village police attempted to pull over a vehicle shortly before it crashed in the city of Miami, leaving one woman dead and another woman injured, a spokeswoman for the city of North Bay Village confirmed.
The crash was reported just after 4 a.m. in the area of Biscayne Boulevard and Northeast 82nd Street.
According to Officer Kenia Fallat, a spokeswoman for the Miami Police Department, officers responded to the area following a crash involving two vehicles.
She said Miami Fire Rescue personnel pronounced a woman in her 20s dead at the scene.
Cellphone video shows the victim’s Toyota Corolla going up in flames after the crash.
“They were saying, ‘Call the police, call the police. Somebody is dying here,’” witness Javier Acosta said.
“When the first units arrived, they found one unit fully engulfed in flames and several people screaming that there was a person trapped in a separate vehicle about 25 yards away,” Miami Fire Rescue Capt. Ignatius Carroll confirmed.
Acosta said a few homeless people in the area rushed over to help.
“Three homeless guys here on the corner, thank God they were here -- they were able to get the lady out of the car,” he said.
The other woman, who is also in her 20s, was rushed to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center in serious condition.
Aaron Vanderpool told Local 10 News he saw North Bay Village police chasing the car that would eventually catch on fire.
“I just saw the car being chased on the causeway before it got here, and it came from a side street and almost hit us,” he said. “They stopped pursuit -- they were going pretty fast -- 80-90 (mph).”
A city spokeswoman, however, said police did not chase the car, but confirmed that officers attempted to pull over the driver.
“At approximately 4 a.m. this morning, a vehicle was observed driving in North Bay Village at a high rate of speed,” Helen Roldan, a spokeswoman for the city of North Bay Village, said in a statement. “Due to the traffic violations observed, the NBVPD attempted to conduct a traffic stop but were unsuccessful in doing so. In accordance with the Village’s policies (including a no-pursuit policy), the NBVPD disengaged at the West end of the 79th Street Causeway and returned to the Village. The vehicle was last seen traveling westbound into the City of Miami’s jurisdiction at a high rate of speed.
“The North Bay Village Police Department was notified a short time later that the vehicle became involved in a traffic crash, which resulted with a fatality.”
The walls of a laundry mat on the corner were scraped up following the crash and a window was busted out.
A tow truck later came to sweep up the debris and tow the cars away.
Another woman in her 20s was transported to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center in serious condition.
Biscayne Boulevard, between 81st and 82nd Streets, was shut down for hours during the investigation, but has since reopened.
City of Miami police are investigating the crash and say speed was definitely a factor. They are now investigating into that driver to see if they were impaired at the time of the crash.
The identity of those involved in Friday’s collision have not yet been released.