The Herald, Sharon, Pa.

Local News

May 19, 2009

UPDATE: Pair in fatal crash identified as suspects in earlier thefts

By Courtney L. Anderson

NEW WILMINGTON — Two people in a truck involved in a fatal crash Friday morning in Wilmington Township, Lawrence County, are suspects in a theft and a burglary hours earlier in New Wilmington, police said.

New Wilmington police said state troopers investigating the crash that killed Ronald E. Holt, 67, of Pulaski, found a number of items from a burglarized store and items stolen from Westminster College campus at the crash scene, police said.

The crash happened about 7:15 a.m. Friday on state Route 158 when a truck driven by Hanna E. Miljevich, 21, of New Castle, crossed the center line and hit Holt�s car, police said.

Holt died at the scene of the crash and Ms. Miljevich and passenger Vern R. Sipe Jr., 19, of New Castle, who owned the truck, were taken to St. Elizabeth Health Center, Youngstown.

A spokeswoman Monday said Ms. Miljevich was in critical condition and Sipe was listed as �satisfactory.�

At 8:20 a.m. Friday, police determined the Amish Peddler, 405 E. Neshannock Ave., had been burglarized between 5:05 and 5:20 a.m. Friday, police said.

Burglars pried open the front doors of the store and stole a variety of furniture, decorative items, shirts, candles, glassware and other merchandise of an undetermined value, police said.

State police got a search warrants for items found in and around the truck at the accident scene and also found a laptop computer and clothes that had been stolen from a vehicle between 7:45 p.m. Thursday and 6:45 a.m. Friday at Westminster, police said.

Police said items stolen from campus are valued at $2,100 and that $250 damage was done to the vehicle, which belongs to a Westminster student who graduated Saturday.

Sipe and Miljevich are suspects in the theft and burglary, police said, and separately, police had stopped Sipe�s truck at 3:30 a.m. Friday and issued him a warning for careless driving. Miljevich was a passenger in the truck at that time.

No charges had been filed against the pair in the theft, burglary or crash as of Monday afternoon.

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