Teenager killed in Rancho Santa Fe crash identified

The Torrey Pines High School senior who was fatally injured in a crash in Rancho Santa Fe early Sunday morning has been identified at Alexander Michael Capozza, 17.

He was a passenger in a car driven by a classmate who was in custody Monday on suspicion of driving drunk and causing the crash that killed Capozza and critically injured another in Rancho Santa Fe, authorities said.

The solo-vehicle crash occurred around 1:45 a.m. Sunday in the 5000 block of La Granada, along the Rancho Santa Fe Golf Club, according to the San Diego County Medical Examiner.

Capozza, who lived in San Diego, died at the scene when the speeding 2008 Mazda 3 crashed and rolled several times into bushes, the Medical Examiner’s Office reported. He died from blunt force head injuries after being ejected from the car.

The California Highway Patrol said the vehicle was full of Torrey Pines students who had just left a party, including a 17-year-old boy later hospitalized in critical condition with blunt head trauma. Neither he nor the boy who was killed were wearing a seatbelt, the CHP reported.

The driver, whose name and gender were not released, faces charges of drunken driving and gross vehicular manslaughter. CHP Sgt. Lew Hall said the driver and two passengers, both 17, were wearing seatbelts and escaped injury.

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