A driver who collided head-on with another vehicle on a Lakeside freeway, killing both herself and the other driver, did it on purpose, according to the California Highway Patrol.
CHP is treating the crash as an “intentional act turned homicide,” according to Officer Kevin Pearlstein.
Last Friday, 29-year-old Trista Lynn Stier drove the wrong way up an off-ramp on State Route 67 and collided head-on with a Select Electric utility truck.
Both Stier and the truck driver, 49-year-old Douglas M. Menegos, died from their injuries. No other passengers were involved in the crash.
“To have some senseless act like this, I can't understand it,” said Frank Lowrey, Menegos’ father-in-law.
Even though Menegos was his son by marriage, Lowrey said he considered him his own child.
“I don’t have sons-in-law, I have family,” he said. “I have sons.”
The tragic circumstances surrounding Menegos' death have his family searching for answers.
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The San Diego County Medical Examiner’s Office lists Stier’s cause of death as suicide. Based on statements from Stier’s family, officers believe Stier was suicidal at the time of the crash and caused the collision on purpose, Pearlstein said.
Multiple witnesses told investigators it appeared that Stier was driving the wrong way intentionally.
Menegos died of multiple blunt force trauma, according to the ME. The Alpine man leaves behind a wife and two children.
Lowrey said Menegos lived for his family.
"Love your family like Doug did and you're going to be...total family. It's just we're all going to miss him so bad," he said.
Services have been planned for Saturday, June 7 at 11 a.m. at the Foothills Christian Church- Main Sanctuary on West Bradley in El Cajon.
The family requests all attendees dress in “Doug Attire” meaning T-shirts, shorts & flip flops. They say that’s how he would have wanted it.
An online fund has been set up to help with college expenses.
