A young Arizona family returning from a holiday weekend in New Mexico were killed in a head-on crash after a 21-year-old driver allegedly fell asleep at the wheel, authorities said.
Giovanni Uballe Huerta and his wife, Kiah Jae Begaye, both 26, died alongside their two young children when their car was struck on State Route 260 near Heber-Overgaard at about 12.30pm on Monday, 7 September.
The collision happened near milepost 300, roughly four miles west of Heber. Arizona Department of Public Safety officials said the couple’s vehicle was hit by a pickup truck travelling in the opposite direction.
The children, named by relatives as Dakota, four, and Malakai, two, were also killed. Two other occupants of the pickup, a 21-year-old woman and a 14-year-old boy from New Mexico, were flown to hospitals in the Phoenix area with serious injuries.
The pickup driver, Jesse David Lovato, of Los Lunas, New Mexico, was arrested and booked into Navajo County Detention Centre on four counts of manslaughter and two counts of aggravated assault. The charges are preliminary and the investigation is continuing.
Court documents cited by local media allege that Lovato told investigators he had been driving from Phoenix towards New Mexico when he fell asleep. He reportedly said he woke when the pickup overturned in the crash.
Police also said marijuana and cannabis vape pens were found in or near the truck, and that Lovato admitted smoking marijuana the previous night. An officer was said to have noted signs of impairment, although authorities have not identified a definitive cause of the collision.
A judge has set Lovato’s bond at $5 million. State Route 260 was closed in both directions for several hours before reopening later that evening.
Family remember high school sweethearts
Huerta and Begaye had been together since high school and married in April, relatives said. They lived in Laveen, where Huerta worked as a mechanic, while Begaye was preparing to launch a Native American clothing business.
The couple’s families described them as devoted parents who loved spending time with their children and wider family.
“It doesn’t seem fair at all because they were so young,” Chrissy Kaibetoney, Begaye’s mother, told local television station KPTV. “They had a whole life ahead of them. They had plans, goals and adventures they wanted to go on.”
Huerta’s father, Joel, said the loss of his only son and two grandchildren felt unreal.
“It’s like a dream, and I’m still waiting to wake up. I wake up, and I’m still in the dream,” he said. “They were my world. My son, my only son. Two generations just gone like that.”
A verified fundraising appeal has been launched to help pay for funeral and burial expenses. It had raised more than $85,000, according to the family.
“They were a family who should have had countless more birthdays, holidays, memories, and moments together,” the appeal said.
