GRANITE FALLS — A crash that killed three people on the Mountain Loop Highway in March has been attributed to speeding, alcohol and illegal drugs.
Snohomish County sheriff’s detectives recently closed their investigation.
They concluded that at the time of the crash, the driver, Mikayla Mikesell, 26, of Marysville, was drunk and high on ecstasy, according to a report by collision detective George Metcalf.
Mikesell’s blood-alcohol level tested at .22, more than double the legal limit of .08 to drive, according to the police report. In addition, the ecstasy in her blood tested at levels that could cause a coma or even death, Metcalf wrote. Ecstasy is the psychoactive club drug also known as “Molly.”
On the evening of March 10, Mikesell was driving a red Toyota Tercel southbound toward Granite Falls.
Her passengers were her longtime friend Dawna Simmons, 27, and Jonathan Simmons-Sumpter, 31. The married couple lived in Granite Falls.
Police believe the Toyota was nearing the highway’s intersection with Canyon Drive at about 9:30 p.m. There wasn’t enough evidence to determine the exact speed, but there were indications the car was traveling at least 67 mph in a 45 mph stretch, Metcalf wrote.
The detective concluded speed was a factor based on “the amount and severity of damage to the vehicle,” he wrote.
Metcalf believes the car went into the grass on one side of the two-lane highway, and Mikesell overcorrected across both lanes. The Toyota then crossed a driveway and went through a barbed wire fence. It traveled down an embankment before striking a cedar tree about 15 feet from the road. The force of the impact caused the car to flip up about 19 feet high into the tree. The Toyota then rotated “violently around the cedar tree,” the detective determined.
The Toyota came to rest in a ditch at the base of the tree.
All three people inside are believed to have died instantly, the sheriff’s office reported. The county medical examiner’s office ruled the deaths accidents from blunt-force trauma.
The crash wasn’t discovered until just before 8 the next morning.
A neighbor was walking his daughter to the school bus stop when he saw the damaged fence, detectives wrote. The neighbor followed the tire tracks, found the crash scene and called 911.
Neighbors in the sparsely populated area told police they heard loud “booms” around 9:30 or 10 the night of the crash. One man thought it was a gunshot or an engine revving, and he looked outside but didn’t see anything.
The weather was clear that night, and the road was dry, according to the crash report obtained by The Daily Herald.
Rikki King: 425-339-3449; rking@heraldnet.com.
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