Updated, Monday, Jan. 20
A Lenexa woman faces a felony second degree murder charge following a deadly wreck late Friday night that police say initially appeared to be the result of drunk driving.
Johnson County District Court records show prosecutors charged Amy Dawn Crouch, 46, with second degree murder on Saturday.
A criminal complaint says Crouch “unintentionally but recklessly under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life” caused the wreck that killed another driver just after 11 p.m. Friday night at the intersection of 89th Terrace and Park Street.
The woman killed has been identified as Tsige Gebrat Mesfin, 48, of Shawnee.
Investigators now say a Toyota RAV4 driven by Mesfin was traveling northbound on Park Street, in a neighborhood just north of Lenexa’s Old Town area, when a Ford Bronco driven by Crouch traveling eastbound struck the RAV4 on the driver’s side.
Initially, police said the RAV4 had been traveling southbound on Park.
Mesfin was pronounced dead at the scene.
Neither Crouch nor another adult woman in the Ford Bronco were injured in the crash.
A search of the Johnson Count Sheriff’s Office’s online inmate log showed Crouch remained in custody as of Monday morning at the county detention center in downtown Olathe.
Crouch’s bond is currently set at $500,000. Her first court appearance is set for Tuesday at 1:30 p.m.
The original story continues below:
Lenexa Police say one woman is dead, and another woman has been arrested following a T-bone crash in a neighborhood near 87th Street and Pflumm Road late Friday night.
Police, firefighters and paramedics were called to the intersection of 89th Terrace and Park Street at 11:10 p.m. for a reported injury crash.
That intersection is a few blocks north of Old Town Lenexa, the city’s historic downtown area.
“Upon arrival, officers located two vehicles involved in the collision, a Toyota RAV4 and a Ford Bronco, both of which had come to rest off the roadway in a nearby yard,” Master Police Officer Danny Chavez, a department spokesperson, said in a news release Saturday morning.
“The Toyota RAV4 was occupied by an adult female driver who was pronounced deceased at the scene by paramedics,” Chavez said in the release.
Chavez said a preliminary investigation showed the Toyota was traveling southbound on Park Street when the Ford, traveling eastbound on West 89th Terrace, struck the Toyota on the driver’s side.
The Ford failed to stop at a stop sign just before the crash, Chavez said.
Two women who were in the Ford were uninjured in the crash.
A Post reporter arrived at the scene as the Ford’s driver completed field sobriety tests with police officers.
Chavez confirmed that the driver of the Bronco was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence.
Johnson County Sheriff’s Office booking logs show that the woman was booked into the adult detention center shortly before 4 a.m. on a pending charge of reckless second-degree murder.
Jail records show she was born in 1979 and is a Kansas City, Missouri, resident.
Police have not released any identifying information about the woman who was killed in the crash.
Officers from the Lenexa Police Department’s Traffic Safety Unit are investigating.
