Seal Beach police seeking hit-and-run driver in crash that injured five people

SEAL BEACH, CA - JUNE 28: Portrait of Seal Beach Police Officer Erin Enos wearing a rainbow patch on Monday, June 28, 2021 in Seal Beach, CA. Seal Beach, Officer Erin Enos, who is lesbian, pitched the rainbow patch idea to Police Chief Philip Gonshak a few months ago. It was immediately approved and ready to be worn June 1st, which is Pride month. The Seal Beach Police Officers Assn. funded the patches and are available for purchase for $10. Proceeds from the patches will go toward The Trevor Project. The city of Seal Beach also held its first Pride march this year, too. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)
Seal Beach police are searching for a hit-and-run driver involved in a collision that left five people injured. (Francine Orr/Los Angeles Times)

Seal Beach police are searching for a hit-and-run driver who was involved in a high-speed collision with another vehicle Saturday night that left five people injured.

Police responded to the collision about 7:15 p.m. at the busy commercial intersection of Pacific Coast Highway and Main Street, authorities said.

An unidentified driver of a Mercedes 300D Class smashed into the side of another vehicle with five people inside, police said. The suspect then abandoned his car and fled on foot into a residential neighborhood known as the Hill.

Police searched the area but failed to find the suspect, authorities said.

All of the occupants in the other vehicle — two unidentified women and three teenage girls — sustained serious injuries and were transported to hospitals, police said. Two of them have since been discharged.

The other three patients — all 17-year-old girls from Orange County — remained in the hospital as of Sunday morning but were listed as stable.

Police said the suspect — whom they described as a man age 18 to 20 — remains at large. It is unknown whether drugs or alcohol factored into the crash. But the suspect appears to have been speeding as he raced through the intersection.

“You can definitely infer it was a high rate of speed,” Seal Beach Police Lt. Julia Clasby said of the crash. Police released a video that shows the suspect's speeding car plow into the side of the other vehicle, which had a green light and was moving through the intersection at the time of the crash.

Before the collision, Huntington Beach police had received calls Saturday evening of a reckless driver heading north on Pacific Coast Highway.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.