DOWNEY >> Authorities have identified a 21-year-old international college student from Japan who died along with a Camp Pendleton Marine in a pickup truck crash along the 5 Freeway in Downey over the weekend.
Kokona Ando, 21, of Rancho Santa Margarita was a passenger riding in the truck when it veered off the roadway and struck a tree about 4:50 a.m. Saturday along the southbound 5 Freeway, just north of Paramount Boulevard, in Downey, according to Los Angeles County coroner and California Highway Patrol officials.
Also killed was Samuel Tristan Flynn, 20, a U.S. Marine based at Camp Pendleton, who was driving the 2002 Dodge Dakota.
Another passenger, a 21-year-old Irvine woman, was also injured in the crash.
A family friend said Ando attended Irvine Valley College as an international student after arriving in the U.S. from Japan in January. It was Ando’s dream to live and study in California, the friend said.
The cause of the crash remain under investigation by the officers from the CHP’s Santa Fe Springs Office.