Local News

COTTONWOOD, Minn. (WCCO) ― Two brothers and the daughter of a teacher were among four children killed in Minnesota's worst school bus crash in at least two decades.

The fourth victim was the son of a former teacher at Lakeview School, the small southwestern Minnesota school wracked by the crash.

According to the patrol, those victims were Hunter Javens, 9, and his brother Jesse Javens, 13, both of Cottonwood; Emilee Olson, 9, also of Cottonwood; and Reed Stevens, 12, of Marshall, Minn.

They were among 28 students on a Lakeview bus that was hit by a van as it carried students home from school Tuesday afternoon. At least 14 other people were hurt, including the drivers of the van and a pickup truck the bus rolled onto.

The patrol also released the names of the drivers involved in the crash. The bus driver was Dennis A. Devereaux, 52, of Cottonwood.

The driver of the van that crashed into the bus was Alianiss N. Morales, 23, who did not have a valid driver's license. The Minnesota State Patrol said that is part of their investigation. The Marshall Independent, citing court records, reported that Morales had pleaded guilty in Chippewa County in 2006 to driving without a valid license.

The driver of the pickup truck the bus landed on was James M. Hancock, 45, of Marshall.

Hancock told the Star Tribune that he saw the van run the stop sign before the accident.

"I saw the maroon van run a stop sign, it blew over the railroad tracks and hit the bus, sending it sliding into me," Hancock told the newspaper from his hospital bed in Sioux Falls, S.D. "The next thing I knew, they were hauling kids out and it was chaos."

Four of the injured were in fair condition Wednesday at Avera Marshall Regional Medical Center. Five others, one of them an adult, were in fair condition at Avera McKennan in Sioux Falls, S.D., spokesman Kenyon Gleason said. One person was in stable condition at Sandford Hospital in Sioux Falls.

Rylee Klocow, a third-grader at the school, and her mother Heidi were among hundreds who streamed into Lakeview School on Wednesday to meet with grief counselors and hear an update on the crash. Emilee was a classmate of Rylee's.

"She was a really good friend and I'll always remember her in my heart," Rylee said.

"It's terrible for the families," Rylee's mother, Heidi Klocow, said. "We knew a lot of people on that bus."

The patrol was reconstructing the crash to determine exactly how it happened. The van was heading east on County Road 24, which has a stop sign as it ends in a T intersection with state Highway 23, the road the bus was traveling. The van struck the bus, which rolled over onto the truck. 

An ex-brother-in-law of Marty Javens said the deaths of Jesse and Hunter were felt by many who stopped by the Javens household on Wednesday.

"It hit everybody in the town really hard, but especially this family, with two of them gone," said Terry Lange, who added that Marty, the boys' father, also lost a daughter more than 20 years ago. In addition, Lange said, Hunter had a twin sister, and there are four older siblings in the blended family.

"All you can do is just be with them," he said of the family members. "Everybody is still in shock."

The Lakeview school is scheduled to resume classes on Thursday.

"We want to get back into a routine," said Superintendent Sheldon Johnson.

Lakeview is a small school of about 585 students that serves Cottonwood and Wood Lake. Plans were made to have grief counselors and clergy available to students, Johnson said.

"I want everyone to know that we're all here to help, and our community will rally around those that especially need our support at this time," said Johnson.

Members of the media weren't allowed into the school Wednesday. Parents and students who went described a moving scene, as "Amazing Grace" was sung and teenagers spontaneously gathered in a circle to pray.

Mary Taylor, who attended the meeting with her 17-year-old son Miles, said she was struck by "the utter silence" when she first entered the building.

"No one knows what to do or say," she said.

Taylor said she knows all of the victims' families. "They're very nice people, salt of the earth, decent religious people."

Another parent, Brenda Doom, said the accident was simply unbelievable.

"You see it on the TV in other places, then all of a sudden you look at the TV and it's us."

The Cottonwood crash was the deadliest since at least 1985, said Nathan Bowie, a spokesman for the Department of Public Safety. The department didn't immediately have any earlier data.

The Minnesota Senate observed a moment of silence in St. Paul for the families in Cottonwood on Wednesday afternoon.

"If there's one place in our society we want to be safe, it's our schools. We absolutely want the transportation of our children to and from the schools to be safe. And sadly, 23 hours ago, that safety was shattered," said Sen. Dennis Frederickson, R-New Ulm.

(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)