A cyclist riding along with a professor who three years ago was struck and killed by a sports car in the Fresno County foothills said the car was straddling the two-lane highway before the head-on collision, according to testimony in a preliminary hearing on Monday.
Adela Santana, 51, an avid cyclist and anthropology professor, was riding a road bike on Oct. 2, 2022, with three friends on Watts Valley Road east of Pittman Hill Road when she was struck by a 2017 Acura NSX driven by Johnson Chang, according to the California Highway Patrol.
Fellow cyclist Heather San Julian testified she was behind Santana on the return trip on Watts Valley Road.
They approached a hill over which they could not see when San Julian said she first saw the Acura crest the incline as it headed at them in the opposite direction just a second or two before it struck Santana.
“It was in the middle of the road the entire time I saw it,” San Julian said on the witness stand. “The center of the car was over the double-yellow line.”
San Julian, who said she’d known Santana for about a decade, testified she did not hear tires screeching or see the Acura attempting to avoid the crash.
Chang, 50, has been charged with felony vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and two misdemeanors of improper turns and unsafe speed.
San Julian said she told a CHP officer at the time the Acura was moving at about 55 mph though she wasn’t sure of that as she testified in court. She recalled the day of the crash, a Sunday, was quieter than usual.
“I felt like I saw it and never heard anything. It came so fast,” she said. “I told the CHP he was driving too fast for the conditions.”
Chang stopped his car and pulled to the shoulder of the road, witnesses testified. Other drivers behind him also stopped, including one person who identified himself as a doctor.
A paramedic who arrived on the scene in a helicopter, Brian Carnes, said he spoke to the doctor at the scene who had already begun life-saving efforts like CPR.
Carnes said heart monitoring equipment showed Santana’s heart was not moving blood through her system when he arrived. The crew continued to try to save her for another 10 minutes before calling the trauma center, which gave them orders to end their efforts.
Forensic Pathologist Dr. Christopher Happy testified Santana had several significant injuries, including lacerations to her heart and liver as well as contusions and cuts on several parts of her body. He said her most significant injury was a severed brain stem.
Santana was a lecturer in anthropology for nearly 11 years at Fresno State and had also taught nearly as long at Clovis Community College.
If convicted on all charges, Chang faces up to six years in prison. The preliminary hearing was scheduled to continue Tuesday.
Adela Luisa Santana is shown in an undated photo. She was killed on her bicycle in an October 2022 collision with a car in eastern Fresno County.