Two people are dead and two critically injured from a high-speed crash following an armed robbery in Yucca Valley Saturday afternoon. Sheriff’s deputies received a report about 3:15 p.m. Saturday that a home in the 7200 block of Palo Alto had been broken into. The victims called back shortly before 4 p.m. to say that the robbers had returned and threatened them with a handgun, putting the gun to their face and saying they were going to shoot up the house. About 5 p.m., the suspects in the robbery were driving eastbound on Alta Loma, at a high rate of speed when just west of Friendly Hills Elementary School, the driver of the Altima lost control of the car. The car crossed over the westbound lanes and went into the desert north of the road, rolling over multiple times. Three helicopters landed at the nearby school to transport the victims to area hospitals. One man, later identified as Michael Cotterly, 37, of Crestline, died at Hi-Desert Medical Center about an hour later. Sean Keller, 21, of Mountain Home, Idaho, died at Desert Hospital in Palm Springs about 6:25; neither the identities or the conditions of the other two victims have been released yet. The California Highway Patrol is investigating the crash; the Sheriff’s Department is investigating the robbery prior to the crash.
TWO KILLED, TWO INJURED IN JOSHUA TREE CRASH FOLLOWING YUCCA VALLEY ARMED ROBBERY
