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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Girl dies in crash after driver reaches for cell

A 6-year-old girl from Grant County died Monday evening in a one-car rollover accident that occurred when her mother, the driver, reached for a cell phone, sheriff’s deputies said. Carla Avila-Juarez died at the accident scene at 6:22 p.m. Monday on Dodson Road South about eight miles north of Royal City. She was not properly restrained in a child seat and was partly ejected, according to Undersheriff John Turley. Her mother, Alma Rosa Avila-Juarez, 25, was headed north in a 1994 Nissan Maxima when she lost control of the vehicle, which drifted to the west side of Dodson Road and onto the shoulder. The driver overcorrected but lost control of the car, which went down a steep embankment and rolled onto its top. Passing motorists, including an off-duty sheriff’s deputy and his wife, tried to help the accident victims, including two younger children who were properly restrained. Avila-Juarez and her two sons, ages 2 and 3, were taken to Samaritan Hospital in Moses Lake with non-life-threatening injuries, Turley said. The children’s father, who works for a nearby farmer, went to the accident scene, where authorities told him what happened, Turley said.