Teen recounts hit-run that killed her sister, 3 nephews - Philly.com

Laporcha Jones recalls looking and not seeing any cars that night two years ago, before crossing Roosevelt Boulevard with sister Samara Banks and Banks' four sons. Jones, then 14, was in the lead with 5-year-old nephew Saa'yon Griffin. Jones recalled that the sound of the crash came from behind as she and her nephew stepped onto the first grass median separating the Boulevard's southbound outer lanes from the inner lanes. "I heard a boom and turned around, and saw the kids on the ground," Jones testified Thursday. Jones did not see her 27-year-old sister because she had been launched 210 feet down the Boulevard by a 2012 silver Audi S4 that came over a crest in the road and hit Banks and the three children. Jones was one of several prosecution witnesses to relive the trauma of the 10:30 p. m. , July 2013 crash on the Boulevard at Second Street in a nonjury trial of the Audi's driver, 24-year-old Khusen Akhmedov. Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Steven R. Geroff is presiding over Akhmedov's trial on four counts of third-degree murder and related charges in what authorities say was a drag race with Ahmen Holloman, 32, driver of a souped-up white 1994... Akhmedov lost control and plowed into Banks and her family at 79 m. p. h. as they crossed the 12-lane Boulevard. Martin testified that she got off the R bus at Third Street and the Boulevard after attending a friend's funeral. Source: www.philly.com