HICKORY, N.C. — A man wanted for a 1997 DWI crash that killed a 51-year-old mom and her two daughters died in a 2020 wreck in Mexico, Hickory police said.
Police said Javier Uresti was driving a pickup truck on Feb. 17, 1997 when Maria Self and her two daughters, Kathy Styles and Ruth Self, were crossing Tate Boulevard in Hickory. They were driving on Ninth Street Lane Southeast when the pickup truck slammed into them.
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Uresti was charged with three counts of second-degree murder in the incident, police said. They also said driving while intoxicated contributed to the crash.
Police said they worked with the FBI for 20 years to look for Uresti. They discovered he fled to his hometown of San Luis Potosi, Mexico shortly after the crash.
Family members said they keep three crosses at the intersection where the crash happened.
“They said they didn’t know who the driver was, so they chose not to charge anyone,” said Lisa Hollifield, Self’s sister.
“I don’t think justice has been served,” said Revonda Towe, Self’s sister.
Wesley Styles was four years old when his mother, Kathy Styles, died.
Styles said he can’t believe Uresti wasn’t charged that night.
“Whenever bad things happen and somebody does something bad, they usually get punished for it,” Styles said.
The police chief says they didn’t have enough evidence to charge him until three days after the wreck. By then, their suspect ran off to Mexico.
“We’re glad to have some closure but our goal was to bring him to justice,” Hickory Police Chief Thurman Whisnant said.
Hollifield said a month ago she reached out to Uresti’s daughter on Facebook. That was when she learned he died in Mexico in a car wreck.
“If there’s ever a case of poetic justice, this is it,” Hollifield said. “This is it right here.”
Hollifield said she got Uresti’s death certificate from his family and shared it with police who, on March 30, confirmed that he died on July 1, 2020, in his hometown.
(Watch Below: ARCHIVE: Coverage of triple-fatal crash in Hickory in 1997)
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