Passenger impaled by a fence post in Mettawa crash

One person was impaled by a wooden fence post and critically injured Monday afternoon in a three-vehicle crash in Mettawa that investigators said was caused by a driver speeding away after a retail theft in Vernon Hills.

Three others were hospitalized with less serious injuries.

The crash happened about 3:45 p.m., when the driver of a Kia sedan headed east on Route 60 blew through a red light at the intersection with Saint Marys Road and was struck by a southbound GMC pickup truck, Lake County sheriff's Deputy Chief Christopher Covelli said.

The impact sent the Kia into a wooden fence, and the pickup truck then collided with a Toyota SUV that was waiting to turn left onto westbound Route 60, Covelli said.

The person in the Kia's front passenger seat was impaled by a portion of the fence and suffered life-threatening injuries.

Sheriff's deputies and police from Vernon Hills used an automated defibrillator on the victim until paramedics arrived to take the patient to Northwestern Medicine Lake Forest Hospital, Covelli said.

The other two people in the Kia, the driver and a back-seat passenger, were hospitalized injuries that were not life-threatening. The driver of the GMC, a 34-year-old Round Lake Beach man, was hospitalized as well.

The two people in the Toyota were uninjured, Covelli said.

According to Vernon Hills police, the Kia driver was speeding recklessly because the three people in the car had just been part of a retail theft. Covelli said investigators recovered stolen merchandise from the Kia.

Covelli said crash investigators are still working to identify the three people who were in the Kia.

The crash is being investigated by the sheriff's office, while the retail theft is under investigation by Vernon Hills police.