LAFAYETTE, La. (AP) - State police have identified the people killed when a SUV crashed into a school bus as the SUV’s driver, 36-year-old Ladonna Cheatham of Patterson, and three of her passengers.
Six-year-old Destiny Cheatham, 7-year-old Dwayne Escort and 16-year-old Marcus Cheatham were not wearing seat belts, were thrown from the vehicle and died, said Trooper First Class Stephen Hammons. Mark Cheatham, 17, was buckled in and suffered moderate injuries, Hammons said.
He did not know whether the driver was the younger Cheathams’ mother, he said in an email. The left rear tire on her 2004 Kia Sorento failed and the SUV veered across a median and into the eastbound school bus on U.S. 90, Hammons said in a news release.
The bus was taking 30 Lafayette High School varsity and junior varsity baseball players and five coaches to Berwick for a scrimmage Saturday. Police said nobody on the bus was seriously hurt.
One player had two cracked vertebrae, 14 or 15 suffered concussions and many had broken noses, coach Sam Taulli told the Daily Advertiser (https://bit.ly/1oCZBzH ). Assistant Coach Cody Ortego, 23, of Lafayette, was taken to a hospital with moderate injuries, Hammons said.
The bus went off the right side of the highway, across grass, a frontage road and a small ditch before stopping in a muddy, harvested sugar cane field.
“How the bus stayed up, I have no idea,” Taulli said, praising driver Amy Dore, 40, of Sunset. “She did a great job of keeping the bus upright. If the bus had flipped over, we’d have been dealing with a much more serious situation.”
Player Hunter Webb needed stitches in his lip and has a loose tooth, said his father, Paul Webb. “His face is all beat up,” he said.
Webb also praised Dore.
“The bus driver is the hero of the day,” he said.
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