A driver and two of his friends died in Charles County, Maryland, early Saturday after police say the driver sped away from an officer at more than 100 mph and then crashed.
Sollan Belina, 28; Luis Daboin, 24; and Joseph Nystrom, 24, were killed, Maryland State Police said.
Daboin lived in Hughesville, Maryland; Belina and Nystrom lived in North Carolina and were visiting him.
Belina, the driver, crashed into a concrete highway median and then into a tree off Route 925 after 2 a.m., police say.
Police believe that alcohol played a role.
The three men were longtime friends, Lawrence Fowler, an uncle of Daboin, said Saturday evening at the scene of the crash.
The victim's uncle said the driver made a bad decision.
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"Because a friend of his made the wrong decision, everyone suffered. But we don't hold that against him or his family. They were all in it together," Fowler said. "They were together at the end. It's the right thing in a lot of ways, even though it's tragic."
Daboin, who lived in the area, graduated from an adult education program two days earlier, his uncle said. In a photo, he smiles in his cap and gown.
"He had his whole life ahead of him," Daboin's uncle said.
Daboin's mother lives in Puerto Rico and survived Hurricane Maria. She is trying to get to Maryland now, Fowler said.
A state trooper saw Belina's 2013 Honda Civic after 2 a.m. Belina pulled in front of her squad car and onto Route 925, and then ran through a red light, police say.
The trooper turned on her lights and sirens and tried to stop Belina, but he sped away and drove into traffic lanes headed the wrong way.
He crossed onto the correct side of the road and "pulled over to the shoulder briefly, as if to stop for the trooper, but then accelerated hard," fleeing the traffic stop, police said.
He sped at more than 100 mph, and the trooper lost sight of the Civic.
Then, police say Belina lost control, hitting a concrete median near Billingsley Road.
The car went airborne and hit a tree, where it came to rest.
The driver and his two passengers were pronounced dead at the scene.
By Saturday evening, someone had placed flowers at the base of the tree Belina's car crashed into.
Anyone with information on the crash is asked to call police at 301-392-1200.
