Indianapolis,IN : A high-speed crash involving an SUV killed two teenagers on April, tuesday 18th 2017

A high-speed crash involving an SUV Tuesday night killed two teenagers and seriously injured three others.

All of those teens are either current or former students at Ben Davis High School.

The crash happened around 9 p.m. Tuesday at I-70 and Harding Street.

Now, state police want to know if someone was chasing that SUV before it wrecked and flipped, ejecting all five people inside.

"It's heartbreaking. It's just heartbreaking," said Sgt John Perrine, Indiana State Police. "You see these young lives lost in such a horrific crash, it's devastating."

Ben Davis student 17-year-old Taylor Parsons, the driver, died in the hospital. 18-year-old Brandon Gross, who also attended Ben Davis, died at the scene.

Classmates say Gross was a dedicated and loyal friend. His life goal was to become a Marine, which is why he joined the Marine Corps Junior ROTC program as a sophomore.

Gross is not the first ROTC death at Ben Davis this year. Frank Wilson died in October.

"All of them that died this year was on ROTC, it's hard, really hard," said Ben Davis sophomore Elexis Ford.

"To be honest, our ROTC has lost two great students," said Jonnathan Bristol, Gross's friend. "Frank, he was actually in the military as well and then losing Brandon Gross. He was actually one of the best drill riflemen was also another loss."

In this loss, Indiana State Police are investigating exactly what happened before the horrific crash at Harding Street.

Was the Pathfinder, driven by Parsons, being chased by another vehicle?

That's what some witnesses told investigators.

So did Olivia Evans, one of the teens hurt in the crash. She's in the hospital with bruises, cuts and an injured lung. She called her grandfather, Milford Evans, from the scene Tuesday with a bystander's cell phone.

"First thing she said to me was, 'Papaw, I wasn't wearing my seat belt'," Evans recalled.

None of the teens in that vehicle were wearing seat belts.

Evans says his granddaughter's boyfriend, 17-year-old Kristopher Church, a former Ben Davis student, is in a coma with a head injury. The other passenger injured is 19-year-old Michael Blackmore.

Evans says Olivia later described what happened before the crash, what police are now looking into.

She says there was some sort of confrontation between girls at Rhodius Park.

"There was a confrontation with some other girls and Olivia and her group started to leave and these other girls got in the car and started following them," Evans said.

She told her grandfather that the pursuit went from the park, onto the interstate and at some point a truck began chasing them, too.

"Tailgating them I think, what I heard, and they just sped up," Evans said.

Police estimate the SUV was traveling near 90 miles per hour, in the passing lane, as it approached Harding Street.

"At the last second, she decided to change lanes all the way over to the Harding Street exit," Perrine explained.

"Tried to get over on the off ramp lane and make the ramp and...they didn't make it," Evans said.

The vehicle rolled several times, ejecting all five teens inside.

Source :
Ben Davis mourns loss of students killed in I-70 crash