Crime & Safety

Driver in Triple Fatal Colma Crash Held on $750,000 Bail

By Bay City News Service

A 25-year-old Daly City man who allegedly ran from the scene of a Memorial Day crash in Colma that killed three people, including his girlfriend, is being held in jail on $750,000 bail, prosecutors and police said Tuesday.

Paul Diaz remains in custody in San Mateo County Jail on suspicion of vehicular manslaughter and felony hit-and-run, District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe said. 

Formal charges could be filed against him as early as Wednesday, Wagstaffe said. 

Colma police Cmdr. Kirk Stratton said Diaz was arrested Monday afternoon, nearly six hours after the green Ford Mustang he was driving crashed into a Honda in the 2000 block of Hillside Boulevard at 7:40 a.m. 

The Mustang broke in half in the collision, causing three passengers to be ejected, Stratton said. The three victims were pronounced dead at the scene.

Diaz was in a dating relationship with one of the victims, who was later identified as Rosa Maria Falla, 23, of Daly City, Stratton said.

The other two victims have been identified as Ruvin Abel Vasquez, 22, and Jonathan Jade Mouton, 21, both of Daly City, according to the San Mateo County coroner's office.

The crash sent the Honda through a cement wall at the Cypress Lawn cemetery. The driver of that vehicle was not seriously injured.

Diaz allegedly fled the scene on foot, Stratton said. Investigators believe he went to the Daly City home of someone with the same last name as Falla, possibly a relative of hers, Stratton said.

Police collected evidence from the home on Monday, he said. Diaz turned himself in to Daly City police at about 1:30 p.m. that day.

Speed and alcohol were believed to have been factors in the collision, which remains under investigation by Colma police.

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