A La Mesa Good Samaritan pulled a woman from a flaming Toyota following an apparent alcohol-related crash.
The wreck occurred on January 2, 2025, near the intersection of Baltimore Drive and Laport Street. “My wife and I hear a loud boom,” he said. “I used one fire extinguisher and realized it wasn’t going to do anything. It felt like it lasted five minutes. Looking at the video, it lasted less than two minutes. I went around to the driver’s side door and pried it open and just pulled her out.”
The man not only pulled the young passenger from her burning car. His doorbell camera video shows that he did it in boxers and bare feet.
How the car got there is a tale with many twists. Witnesses say the Scion was northbound on Baltimore Drive. The driver lost control, crossed the median, and then collided with an evergreen tree in the middle of the road.
The force of the collision was so great that car glass was sprayed on the roof of the home across the street. The Scion barreled the wrong way toward the Good Samaritan’s front yard, finally coming to rest after crashing into his palm tree.
La Mesa police say the 20-year-old driver remained at the scene and was arrested for driving under the influence. La Mesa was founded in 1869, and The City of La Mesa was incorporated on February 16, 1912.
More recently, in 2020, La Mesa was the site of serious civil unrest in the wake of the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota.