Friday, February 23, 2018
By DAVID SKOLNICK
skolnick@vindy.com
YOUNGSTOWN
A 25-year-old Warren woman driving the wrong way on the state Route 711 connector northbound causing a head-on accident with a tractor-trailer leading to the death of her two young children and her brother, police said.
The accident occurred about 12:30 a.m. Friday shortly after Kanosha Bason, the driver, got on Route 711 in an SUV the wrong way, likely on a Gypsy Lane ramp, said police Lt. William Ross, the head of the accident investigation unit.
The victims are Noreyion Bason, 7, and Nialaisha Bason, 5, the driver’s children, and Cedrick Lyons, the driver’s 32-year-old brother, Ross said.
They are all from Warren.
The children were in the back seat while Lyons was in the front passenger seat.
All were dead at the scene of the crash, Ross said.
“It was a very tragic accident,” he said.
Police will confer with city Prosecutor Dana Lantz likely next week to determine if the SUV driver will be charged, Ross said.
It’s “probably likely” she will be charged with a crime that could rise as high as aggravated vehicular homicide, police Chief Robin Lees said.
“It depends on what we find with the evidence,” Lees said.
Bason was in St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital late Friday with injuries she sustained in the traffic accident, Lees said.
“She was conscious and coherent when I talked to her” at the scene of the accident, Ross said.
“People need to be careful on and off ramps particularly if you’re not familiar with them,” Lees said. “This is a difficult accident [to deal with] because two children lost their lives.”
Gilbert DeMello, 53, of Youngstown, the tractor-trailer driver, was treated for minor injuries.
The highway northbound between U.S. Route 422 and Gypsy Lane was closed for about 12 hours, most of it because of the need to remove steel beams that were on the back of the trailer.