Anchorage police reported Wednesday that they were investigating a fatal vehicle accident that occurred in the early-morning hours and left a 30-year-old passenger dead. Police also said the driver of the vehicle fled the scene of the crash but was found and arrested on outstanding warrants.
According to a release from the Anchorage Police Department, the accident was reported around 2:20 a.m. at a trailer court at Boniface Parkway and 34th Avenue in East Anchorage. A 911 caller reported an Oldsmobile Bravada had collided with a tree, and police said the vehicle, driven by 23-year-old Val Tapusoa, impacted the tree on the vehicle's passenger side.
"It was reported that the 30-year-old female passenger was not breathing and was later declared dead at the scene," police wrote in the release. The victim was not immediately identified pending notification of next of kin.
Tapusoa then fled from the scene on foot, police said, only to be found about 90 minutes later inside a trailer. Tapusoa was arrested and taken to the Anchorage Correctional Complex for probation violations stemming from previous convictions of vehicle theft and escape, police said.
In July 2013, Tapusoa was arrested for driving a stolen vehicle in Anchorage and four days later went missing from the Cordova Center halfway house, where he was being held on the vehicle theft charges, said police spokeswoman Anita Shell.
By Wednesday evening, new charges had not yet been filed against Tapuso. Police were waiting on results from toxicology tests, Shell said.