Eight-year-old Petronila Ramos-Mejia didn’t want to go to her babysitter that evening. She wanted to stay with her grandfather, Juan Mejia-Garcia.
Juan and his wife, Petronila’s grandmother, Daniela Manea, worked opposite shifts at one of two meat-processing factories that sustain the economy of this dusty community of 12,000 inhabitants, the only city in Oklahoma with a majority Hispanic population.
It was Aug. 5, 2023. Juan and Petronila, members of the city’s community of 1,600 Guatemalan immigrants, left their home on the south side of Guymon to visit relatives who lived closer to where Daniela was completing her shift. It was dusk when they picked Daniela up to return home.
They took a shortcut: Mile 33 Road east of Guymon avoided the stoplights downtown. Juan knew the route well, south to U.S. 412, then west toward home.
Sunset glowed on the horizon, tucked beneath a shadowy approaching storm. There was still light, but Juan had the Corolla’s headlights on. The car was on loan from the family’s pastor; Juan was driving the speed limit.
Petronila was in the back seat. Daniela, exhausted from her shift, drifted off to sleep as a few raindrops pattered the windshield.
At the same moment, a Chevy Tahoe driven by law enforcement officer Eldon “Len” Halliburton, a member of the District One Drug Task Force, sped west on U.S. 412, approaching the intersection at Mile 33 Road.
The timing was perfect, it had to be — two wrong things happening in the most catastrophic way.
First, for reasons unknown, Juan drove past the stop sign at the corner of Mile 33 Road and U.S. 412, where he knew to turn for home, according to Oklahoma Highway Patrol records. Instead, the Corolla shot into the intersection at between 50-60 mph in a posted 55 mph zone, according to a statement from District One District Attorney George “Buddy” Leach, who controls the drug task force of which Halliburton was a member.
Second, the Tahoe driven by Halliburton, which five seconds earlier had been traveling at 85 mph in a 70 mph zone, according to the vehicle’s Crash Data Retrieval file — a “black box” of information — entered the intersection and slammed into the side of the Corolla. The vehicle’s dash camera revealed a clear view of Juan’s car on a collision course. The Tahoe appeared to drift slightly toward the shoulder and neither skidded nor swerved, slowing only slightly before impact, the black box data shows.
The Corolla spun and flipped on its side and wound up in a ditch on the south side of the intersection. The Tahoe skidded wildly and careened off the road 80 yards farther west on U.S. 412.
Juan and Daniela were grievously wounded but remained in the Corolla. Petronila was thrown violently through the rear window, and came to rest about 40 feet from the car on an embankment of scrub grass.
Halliburton was injured, as well, less seriously.
Daniela recalled almost nothing from the moment of impact — she was asleep — but she woke to see Juan hanging from his seat belt, unconscious. She reached to jostle his shoulder.
She remembered nothing more.
The next 38 minutes of law enforcement and medical response have, for the most part, remained a void. The details of what happened after that, pieced together from documents, interviews and law enforcement records, paint a disturbing picture of an investigation that was haphazard, incompetent or hasty by design.
An investigation by reporters with Oklahoma Watch and The Oklahoman, one that was stalled by a months-long court battle for open records and stymied by systematic denials of requests for interviews with those who could fill in the gaps of what happened, provide the clearest look yet at the accident and its aftermath and raise troubling questions about law enforcement’s response to a tragic accident involving one of their own and an immigrant family.
In a statement to the news organizations, Leach said the highway patrol had complete control of the investigation, adding: “There is no evidence of criminal conduct, impairment, or reckless behavior by Mr. Halliburton.”
But the investigative records turned over to the news organizations by Leach and the Oklahoma Department of Public Safety show irregularities in how the investigation was conducted.
The highway patrol collision report said there were no photographs taken of the scene, though gathering photographic evidence is standard protocol in highway fatality investigations. Department of Public Safety staff initially said there was no dash camera or body camera footage from any of the four Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers who responded to the incident or from the DA-owned Tahoe. The first logged action after a trooper arrived on the scene — 38 minutes after impact — was to call for a wrecker unit to tow away the Corolla. Both cars would be removed within an hour, and it would be a half-hour more before the trooper assigned to investigate the fatalities would be recorded as en route to the site. A collision report required by law bears a stamp saying “investigation incomplete.”
Juan and Daniela were taken to separate hospitals; Juan died 90 minutes after the crash.
Pedro Ramos-Mejia shows photos of Petronila Mejia-Ramos to Oklahoma Watch and The Oklahoman at his home in Guymon, Okla., on Sunday, April 12, 2026. (Nathan Fish/The Oklahoman) Halliburton was treated and released that same night.
As troopers canvassed the crash scene that evening, there would be one more hint of a rushed investigation. They failed to discover the 8-year-old girl lying in the grass just 40 feet away from the Toyota.
Her body would not be discovered for six hours.
Justice in No Man's Land
In February 2025, after an Oklahoma Watch investigation uncovered a multimillion-dollar District One Drug Task Force ticketing scheme, the news organization received a deluge of tips from the Panhandle, a region once known as No Man's Land, with dozens of residents coming forward to complain of abuses in the administration of justice and a long-standing culture of impunity ruled by family dynasties.
One tip from a person who asked to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal described a multiple-fatality accident on the edge of Guymon that killed an 8-year-old girl. Close to two years old but fresh in local memories, the incident had not been properly investigated, the person claimed.
“This was covered up quick, quick, and I didn’t understand why,” the person said in an email.
Public records and local media accounts of the crash showed inconsistencies. Early reports of the incident named Juan Garcia and Daniela Manea but failed to include the name of the young girl killed or the extent of Daniela’s injuries. Halliburton was named in one account, but none identified him as a law enforcement officer.
Official accounts of the accident, including highly redacted Oklahoma Highway Patrol collision and investigation reports and an incident report featuring a truncated moment-by-moment listing of law enforcement activity from a few minutes after the collision to the following morning, raised as many questions as they answered.
According to local authorities, the highway patrol was the first to respond to the scene and exercised sole jurisdiction throughout the matter.
The collision occurred at about 8:39 p.m., according to the highway patrol’s investigation report, which indicated that the Corolla had failed to yield at a stop sign.
Eleven minutes later, OHP dispatchers logged the incident, and 30 seconds after that a flurry of entries in the span of a second established the location of the collision and sent Trooper Austin Lozano to the scene.
It is still unclear how authorities were notified of the incident, though it’s clear they knew a drug task force unit was involved before arriving at the scene, dispatch records show.
Following the trooper’s arrival, there was an additional 20 minutes of dispatch silence before Lozano called for a wrecker unit to take away the Corolla. Thirty-eight minutes had passed since the incident was first logged.
A few minutes later, the trooper sent an initial incident report to DPS, noting that Juan Garcia was in critical condition and en route to the hospital. Records further indicate that Halliburton had a possibly broken arm and was also sent to the local hospital, while Daniela Manea was sent 40 minutes farther to a hospital in Liberal, Kansas, due to her severe injuries.
By the time Trooper Trent Cagle, of Troop Z, the OHP unit called in to investigate fatal accidents, arrived at the scene, both cars had already been towed away.
Not until after midnight, when a state trooper knocked on the door of the couple’s son, Pedro Mejia-Ramos, to notify him about his father’s death, would authorities learn that another person had been in the car — Petronila. It would be another two hours before they found her body.
Next of Kin
On the night of the accident, Pedro returned home from his job at McDonald’s about 10 p.m. and had expected his parents to be home already. He didn’t dwell on it, thinking they had stopped for dinner, but he soon started receiving an influx of phone calls from unknown numbers.
He called his older brother, Francisco, who worked at the same meat-packing plant as his parents. Fransico said they had gotten off about 8 p.m. and he assumed they were already home.
“I haven’t seen them — they’re not here yet,” Pedro remembers telling his brother.
About midnight, the brothers' worries peaked after Pedro called both of his parents repeatedly, and to his surprise, a man speaking English answered his mother’s phone, indicating the police had been trying to get in contact.
Francisco came to the family home, and about 1 a.m. a trooper knocked on the door. Pedro recalls the trooper describing the accident and that Daniela had been taken to a hospital in Liberal, and that their father had died at the local Guymon hospital from his injuries — his body was being sent to the medical examiner in Oklahoma City.
“At that time, when the police told me about my dad and my mom, they didn’t tell me anything about Petronila,” Pedro said. He had forgotten about his niece in the chaos, thinking she was safe with her babysitter.
Pedro left for Liberal to join his mother, and she was soon transferred to a hospital in Wichita, Kansas, for the severity of her injuries and head trauma.
Francisco and his wife checked with the babysitter — Petronila hadn’t been there. The family then scrambled to call the police again — the young girl was unaccounted for.
Pedro recalled that at the time, the police said they did not find the body of a little girl. Dispatch records show troopers returning to the scene at 2:13 a.m. after the call from the family.
Her body was discovered at 2:23 a.m. near the site that had been cleared by investigators and first responders just hours earlier, and was identified as the 8-year-old granddaughter a few minutes later. It was another 26 minutes before notification was made to the medical examiner.
None of the records reviewed by Oklahoma Watch or The Oklahoman indicate whether Petronila died on impact or whether she might have survived had they found her immediately.
The medical examiner’s report cited the probable cause of death as cervical spine dislocation. Time of death was not listed.
In the following weeks, Pedro attempted to get more information about the incident. He had heard rumors in the community that a law enforcement officer was driving the other car, but no officials had told the family about the other driver.
He requested documents from the troopers who had told him of the deaths and claimed that investigators directed him to go through officials in Oklahoma City. He said he had no luck and didn't pursue it further as he had finances and funeral arrangements to sort out.
The family said that they were never notified and never received confirmation that the driver was local law enforcement until reporters knocked on their door two years later.
A Discrepancy Between Local and State Authorities
In an attempt to fill in the gaps, Oklahoma Watch and The Oklahoman reached out to all agencies that were named in the initial incident report.
The Department of Public Safety, the highway patrol's parent agency, first denied the existence of any dash camera or body camera footage from the incident.
The incident report from OHP, detailing the moment law enforcement learned that the body of a young girl may have been left behind, indicated that outreach had been made to Chief Grant Wadley, of the Guymon Fire Department, which provides ambulance service for a 1,700-square-mile area of the Panhandle.
In June 2025, reporters contacted Wadley. He cited medical privacy laws known as HIPAA in refusing to offer details on what he saw on-site during the initial ambulance run. Nevertheless, Wadley confirmed that a routine search of the immediate area around the Corolla had failed to discover a third victim of the accident lying only 40 feet away.
Nearly six hours after the initial accident and law enforcement had left the scene, a call came in for another victim who might still be alive, Wadley said.
“It was reported as a subject found — possibly injured,” Wadley said. “Of course, we respond the same way and we get out there, and that’s when they found the child.”
The day after Wadley spoke to reporters, DA Leach, who serves four counties in the Panhandle area and at the time of the accident employed Halliburton, reached out to Oklahoma Watch unprompted with a statement about the collision. In it, Leach offered condolences to the family and provided some additional details about the information he said he had received. Leach also provided the Tahoe dash camera footage that DPS told reporters did not exist.
Leach said that DPS had provided the video to him so that it could be passed along to the media.
The 18-second video includes no sound and cuts off an instant before the collision. In his statement, Leach claimed that the footage cut out due to impact.
A semi-truck drives on Highway 412 at mile 33 in Guymon, Okla., on Monday, April 13, 2026. (Nathan Fish/The Oklahoman) In the video the Corolla can be seen approaching the intersection without slowing. The Tahoe also moves down the highway at a high speed for six seconds, appearing to drift slightly over the shoulder line, while the Corolla is in a direct line of vision.
In two separate statements to Oklahoma Watch and The Oklahoman, Leach said that his office was not involved with the investigation and that OHP collected all the evidence and conducted all the interviews.
Daniela, the only survivor from the Corolla, said she was never interviewed by police. Other family members also said that officials never reached out to them for further questioning.
More troubling questions resisted explanation. If the cause of the accident was obvious, as the incident report and Leach’s statement suggested, why was the accident scene cleared before a trained fatality investigator arrived? Why were DPS and DA Leach appearing to contradict one another over records requests? What was Halliburton doing at the time of the accident that prevented him from braking, and why did Leach’s statement indicate the speed of the Corolla but omit the speed of the Tahoe?
In August 2025, Oklahoma Watch filed a lawsuit to obtain access to the Tahoe’s black box to verify its speed. Reporters also returned to Guymon to learn more about the family that Petronila and her grandfather left behind.
Family Roles in Flux
At the time of his father’s death, Pedro was going into his final year of high school and excited to graduate. The accident upended everything.
In the immediate aftermath, the family scrambled to find money for arrangements to send the two bodies back to Guatemala to be buried in Juan’s hometown. The family crowd-sourced, gathering support and donations from their local church as they weathered the weeks of grief.
Daniela ceased working altogether as she healed from her traumatic injuries and the loss of her husband and granddaughter.
“She was in really, really bad shape,” Pedro said, recalling his mother having bruises everywhere and being unable to move.
Three years later, he described his mother as “physically different.” Daniela said to this day she has to get out of bed slowly and frequently experiences vertigo and intense migraines.
While Daniela took a year off to recover, Pedro was thrust into the role of household breadwinner and caretaker. He continued to go to school and work at McDonald’s, and later started work at a meat processing plant, where he still works today.
He said he had to grow up fast. “I just told myself to be strong and all I did is take care of Daniela,” he said.
Pedro also had to learn the ins and outs of medical bills, car insurance and household finances. His brother helped him sort out documents and provided support to help them get back on their feet. They lived with Francisco for about a month before moving into a new house.
Pedro said that his mother was unable to return to their old home. “She said that she had so many memories of my dad and my little niece,” he described. “And she said that if she goes back there — she couldn’t handle it.”
Juan had insurance, but the Corolla was registered under their family friend and community pastor’s name. The family said the pastor’s insurance paid out both parties $50,000 each. In the end, Pedro said his family received roughly $17,000, with the rest of their share going to pay Daniela’s medical bills.
In July 2025 Halliburton filed a lawsuit against the family for injuries and damages in excess of $75,000. He later withdrew the lawsuit. His lawyer did not respond to questions asking why the suit was dropped.
‘Investigation Incomplete’
After Leach indicated that DPS held all of the case documents, reporters returned to the agency despite prior denials and filed suit for the Tahoe’s black box data, or information recorded by the vehicle indicating the speed at which the vehicle was traveling and whether Halliburton made any effort to brake the vehicle.
The agency pushed back against the request, but provided a number of other documents, including a highly redacted investigation report and a similarly redacted Oklahoma Highway Patrol collision report with a large pink watermark stamped “Investigation Incomplete” across each page.
Oklahoma state law sets a mandatory 30-day period for completing a report for any collision resulting in injury or damages of $500 or more; the period is shortened to 20 days in the case of accidents involving fatalities. Multiple violations of the statute can result in jail time.
DPS said that the traffic report labeled incomplete was the only collision report they had regarding the Guymon crash.
The documents provided by DPS uniformly suggested that Juan Garcia alone caused the collision by not yielding to a posted stop sign. None of the OHP documents list the speed of the Tahoe, despite the black box data being in their possession, and none of the documents indicate that any involved parties were ever interviewed. A brief narrative summary attached to the report says it is one of 10 pages, but the remaining nine pages were redacted, the report states.
DPS Assistant General Counsel Christa Alderman clarified that the black box data statutorily falls into a category of information that may be released to the public, but is not mandated.
“DPS’s firm stance is that we only release what we are specifically required to,” Alderman said in an email response to reporters’ request. “We ‘may’ release more than that if we want to, but we don’t.”
Reporters wrote to Assistant Attorney General and Public Access Counselor Anthony Sykes, to request that an exception to the DPS stance be made in the case of the death of an 8-year-old girl. Sykes’ office last year established an online complaint form for open records to safeguard openness in government.
The letter to Sykes went unanswered.
In April 2026, after numerous legal delays and extensive negotiations, reporters agreed to drop their lawsuit against the state of Oklahoma in exchange for the CDR file that would show the speed of the Tahoe.
A crash expert who examined the black box data confirmed that five seconds before impact the Tahoe was traveling 85 mph, 15 mph over the posted speed limit.
Personal injury attorney James Biscone, of Oklahoma City law firm Johnson & Biscone, explained two legal concepts that may complicate the official accounts’ repeated suggestion that Juan was wholly responsible for the accident.
First, Biscone said that a principle known as comparative negligence divided blame among parties in an accident.
“Imagine a crash where one driver ran a red light, but the other driver was texting,” Biscone said. “A jury could find that both drivers contributed to the collision.”
Daniela Manea holds a photo of her family in her home in Guymon, Okla., on Sunday, April 12, 2026. (Nathan Fish/The Oklahoman) Second, a less regularly invoked principle known as the last clear chance doctrine addressed drivers’ obligation to take reasonable steps to avoid harm, Biscone said.
“If you had enough time and distance to brake or change lanes but failed to do anything at all, a jury could consider whether you had the last clear chance to prevent the crash,” Biscone said.
The collision report prepared by Trooper Lozano lists under contributing factors: “Unknown/No Improper Act — No Improper Action By Driver,” referring to Halliburton.
Leach said he was aware of no evidence that Halliburton was distracted while approaching the intersection.
Medical records indicate that Juan Garcia’s body was tested for drugs and alcohol after he died; none were found. Halliburton was never tested, according to DPS records.
In April, reporters received a second statement from DA Leach saying, “OHP determined that the Tahoe was traveling at approximately 70 mph at the time of the collision.”
No document examined by reporters estimated the speed of the Tahoe at 70 mph. When presented with the evidence of the black box file from reporters, Leach referenced a direct conversation with Cagle, of Troop Z.
“Trooper Cagle told me the approximate speed at contact,” Leach wrote in an email. “Maybe, he meant 77 miles per hour.”
In another discrepancy, Leach said in his statement that the airbags in the Toyota did not deploy. “The vehicle had no working airbags at the time,” he said. But photographs of the vehicle taken by the family after it was towed show deployed airbags.
Asked about the inconsistency, Leach said Trooper Cagle told him that he believed the airbags did not deploy because the airbag control module pulled from the Toyota contained no data.
Leach said that Halliburton was first hired to his office in September 2016 and left in February 2021. He was hired again in November 2022 and worked until his accident in August 2023. Leach described Halliburton as having back surgery before returning to regular duties in April 2024. He retired in July 2025.
He had previously been employed with the Goodwell Police Department, Guymon Police Department and the Texas County Sheriff's Office.
Public records revealed that despite his status as law enforcement, Halliburton had received numerous traffic citations: two for speeding, two for failure to wear a seat belt, two for failure to carry proof of insurance, and one for illegally driving into a marked wildlife management area.
Reporters left physical messages at Halliburton’s Guymon home and made several attempts to contact him through email and telephone. He did not respond.
Reporters also attempted to contact Lozano, Cagle and two other troopers dispatched to the accident scene and listed as involved in the investigation.
In response to questions for the troopers about the first 20 minutes of response, about why there were no photos taken, and about whether Petronila was alive when she was found, OHP Public Affairs Officer Mark Southall said, "The Department of Public Safety will not be responding to these questions and has no further statement regarding this case.”
Halliburton now works for the Goodwell Police Department and as a teacher at Guymon High School. He teaches driver's education.
Three Years Later
Petronila was in elementary school at the time of the accident, and memorials posted online from teachers and community members described her as a bright light gone too soon. “Petronila was the sweetest little girl,” her first-grade teacher wrote. “She always had a smile on her face and was ready to give you the biggest hug.”
She was a very well-behaved and happy little girl, Daniela said, getting choked up three years later as she described her granddaughter’s infectious giggle.
Pedro described his niece as someone who would talk with anyone in the world, “She never felt shy,” he said in Spanish.
He fought back tears, describing his father, saying he misses his advice and wishes he could tell him about life nowadays.
Pedro described Juan as a good father, respected in the community, very serious and responsible, but full of humor and wisdom. “When it first happened, it was very hard losing him because he was always there.”
He said not a day goes by that he does not think about him, and described his father as someone who loved to play little games and make jokes to see people smile. “He loved to laugh,” he said.
Timeline of the Aug. 5–6, 2023 crash near Guymon involving drug task force agent Eldon Halliburton
A drug task force agent speeds east of Guymon, killing two people — and a child goes missing for hours.
Aug. 5, 2023
8:39 p.m.
Drug task force agent Eldon Halliburton is speeding at Mile 33 Road and U.S. 412, about 1½ miles east of Guymon, and slams into a Toyota Corolla driven by Juan Mejia-Garcia. His wife, Daniela Manea, and their 8-year-old granddaughter Petronila Mejia-Ramos are in the vehicle. Petronila is ejected through the rear window and lands 40 feet away.
8:50 p.m.
Oklahoma Highway Patrol dispatch creates an incident and assigns Trooper Austin Lozano to respond. How OHP learned a district attorney's unit was involved remains unclear.
8:54 p.m.
OHP dispatch contacts Texas County 911 dispatch and advises that a trooper is en route.
8:57 p.m.
Lozano arrives on scene.
9:18 p.m.
After 20 minutes of dispatch silence, Lozano summons Panhandle Towing for the Corolla.
9:21 p.m.
Dispatch notes Garcia is in critical condition, en route to a hospital in Guymon. Manea is en route to a hospital in Liberal, Kansas. Halliburton is en route to a hospital in Guymon.
9:50 p.m.
Panhandle Towing takes possession of the Corolla.
9:54 p.m.
Tiger Towing takes possession of Halliburton's Tahoe.
10:09 p.m.
Garcia is pronounced dead at Memorial Hospital of Texas County.
10:26 p.m.
OHP dispatch logs Trooper Trent Cagle, of Troop Z — OHP's unit dedicated to investigating vehicular fatalities — as en route to the scene.
Aug. 6, 2023
2:04 a.m.
Lozano arrives at the Garcia family's address and informs Garcia's son, Pedro Mejia-Ramos, that his father has been killed.
~2:08 a.m.
Pedro leaves for Liberal to be with Daniela. His sister-in-law asks where Petronila is. The family learns the girl is missing and alerts authorities to a possible third victim from the Corolla.
2:13–2:15 a.m.
Lozano returns to the crash site. OHP dispatch calls for a new ambulance and assistance from Texas County to search for Petronila.
2:23 a.m.
Lozano reports that Petronila has been found. Her exact time of death is never recorded.
2:49 a.m.
Twenty-six minutes after Petronila is found, OHP dispatch informs the medical examiner's office of a second fatality.
4:13 a.m.
Incident status is logged as "Closed." According to Lozano's collision report, no pictures were taken.
The incident was reopened the following morning for a subsequent investigation — long after both vehicles had been removed from the scene.
Sources: OHP dispatch logs, Lozano collision report. | Oklahoma Watch
Ed. Note: This timeline was updated on May 31, 2026, to correct an error. The drug task force officer was speeding. The Corolla ran the stop sign.
About this story: This story was done in partnership with Oklahoma Watch and The Oklahoman. It is the third story in Oklahoma Watch's series, Unaccountable: Rural Justice in Oklahoma, investigating problematic law enforcement practices in the state's 60 non-metropolitan counties. It is a follow-up to Oklahoma Watch's Justice In No Man's Land series. J.C. Hallman is an investigative reporter for Oklahoma Watch. Maria Guinnip is a former Oklahoma Watch intern who is now a government accountability reporter for The Oklahoman.
This article first appeared on Oklahoma Watch and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.