About 9 p.m. Sunday, when as many as 80 people from a local LDS church ward were participating in a "walk about," in which families go door to door to eat snacks and chat with other neighbors, residents say two teens, who appeared to be racing, were heading westbound at high speeds on Emmeline Drive near Friendship Drive.
Julie Gamble was entertaining about 30 children on her lawn at 5828 Emmeline Drive when the teens lost control of their motorcycles, one plowing into the crowd, injuring three people.
"Two bikes came racing down and it seemed like they were going 100 miles per hour," said Gamble, whose 10-year-old son was in the yard at the time, but was not hurt. "It barely missed him and at least 30 other kids."
Dylan Stroud was the first to be hit. The 3-year-old was airlifted to Primary Children's Medical Center with a broken leg. Stroud's neighbor, 32-year-old Shelby Gann and her 8-month-old infant she was pushing in a stroller were hit next by the motorcycle. Gann was treated for leg and head injuries at University Hospital where she was released early Monday morning. The infant was airlifted to Primary Children's Medical Center for observation.
"You could hear them coming fast, then they came around the bend and it seemed they were going 80 miles an hour," said Dylan's father, Rick Stroud. "For as hard as the motorcycle struck him, I'm amazed he's doing so well."
A 1-year-old infant in a stroller also was knocked over in the crash, but was uninjured.
A driver of one of the motorcycles has been identified as 19-year-old Nicholas Christiansen of Herriman. Christiansen did not have a license to drive a motorcycle and was not wearing a helmet at the time of the wreck, said Lt. Paul Jaroscak of the Salt Lake County Sheriff's Department.
Jaroscak said that they are still unsure whether the 17-year-old driver of the other motorcycle was wearing a helmet, but that they did confirm he was licensed to drive the motorcycle. The department has still not determined how fast the teens were driving at the time of the crash.
Christiansen was treated overnight at Jordan Valley Hospital and was released Monday.
Residents of the quiet neighborhood say that speeding on Emmeline Drive happens regularly and have unsuccessfully petitioned the city for more stop signs.
"This was a tragedy, and it didn't have to happen. People violated the law," Herriman Mayor Lynn Crane said. "The city will do anything to make sure our neighborhoods are safe."
But residents may not see new stop signs or a speed bumps on Emmeline Drive anytime soon.
Crane said that before such a plan can go before the City Council, a city engineer will have to review the idea.
"When an accident like this occurs, lots of questions are asked," he said. "The city will view the options available and obviously part of the discussion will be whether it is feasible."
Still, Garcia said that she and a number of residents on the block plan to show up at the Herriman City Council meeting Thursday night to demand something be done to curb the speeding.
"This really needs to be a wake-up call for the city," she said.
