Speeding, impairment suspected in fatal wreck in Charlotte’s Eastover area, CMPD says
Excessive speeding may have caused a weekend wreck that killed two people and injured two others in Charlotte’s Eastover neighborhood, police said.
Impairment also is suspected, but test results are pending, Charlotte-Mecklenburg police said.
At 2:27 a.m. Sunday, police responded to a report of a crash involving a vehicle striking a tree and catching fire in the 800 block of Colville Road. Officers found a burning 2019 Mercedes E450 station wagon and its four occupants at the scene, police said in a statement Monday.
The vehicle was traveling north on Colville near Twilford Place at a high rate of speed, police said. It lost control and struck the curb to the right several times. The vehicle then exited the curve in the 800 block of Colville Road, and ran off the road to the right. It struck a set of brick steps and then a tree before catching fire.
Robert McElveen Walker, 20, and Henry Huntley Melvin, 20, were identified Monday as the deceased, but police gave no other information.
Police said Walker was the driver, and Melvin was the left-rear passenger. Melvin was removed from the vehicle by the other two passengers, but Medic pronounced him dead on the scene.
Walker and Melvin were 2020 graduates of Myers Park High School, according to a Facebook post from the school.
The two surviving passengers were transported to Atrium Health Main with non-life-threatening injuries, police said.
There were no known witnesses to the crash, police said.
Anyone with information about the crash can call Detective Pressley at 704-432-2169, Crime Stoppers at 704-334-1600 or visit the Crime Stoppers website at charlottecrimestoppers.com/.
This story was originally published August 2, 2021 at 2:26 PM.
