What was initially thought to be a hit-and-run that killed a Rankin County teen has been determined to be an accident.
Irina Gutierrez, 17, was walking along Old Fannin Road on the night of Feb. 26 when she was struck by a vehicle. According to the Rankin County Sheriff's Office, she was found unresponsive and taken to a hospital where she was later pronounced dead.
Deputies first thought she had been struck by more than one vehicle because a driver who struck her — and who remained on the scene — said Gutierrez was on the ground when she hit her.
"That was the assumption we had at the time and we continued to operate under that assumption in the initial part of the investigation," Paul Holley, legal counsel for the Rankin County Sheriff's Office, said Tuesday.