ST. LOUIS — In mid-afternoon, a long line of drivers were brought to a sudden halt after a deadly multi-car crash in north St. Louis.
"I saw several cars going really slow," driver Jacob Hicks said.
Hicks and his wife got stuck in the traffic jam near the intersection of North Broadway and Humboldt Avenue.
"I moved all the way up and then I saw crime scene tape, just wondering what was going on?" said Hicks.
Police said at around 4 p.m. a man sped north down Broadway in a black Chevy Cruse.
"At that point, we believe because of the stopped traffic, they tried to go around traffic and oncoming traffic," said Lieutenant Paul Lauer with the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department.
Investigators said the driver then ran a red light, hit a blue Chrysler head-on and caused a chain-reaction crash that involved five cars, including a St. Louis City vehicle.
"Some of those cars continued spinning. They hit two other stopped cars that were not hit as seriously," Lauer said.
Five people were hurt.
A woman driving a black, Honda CRV suffered critical injuries and was trapped in her mangled car. Police said firefighters had to cut the woman out of the Honda. She suffered internal bleeding and later died at a hospital.
"Oh, wow. My prayers to her family. This stuff happens all the time," Jacob Hicks said.
Hicks added he's witnessed drivers traveling well over the posted 35-mile-an-hour limit.
"Ridiculous. It's crazy. You see people run the red lights down here all the time. They need speed bumps up here on this street," added Hicks.
Police said speeding is a known problem on the north city street.
"We were just up here recently as part of the Traffic Division to do speed enforcement in this area because of the complaints of speeding," Lauer said.
As of Friday night, police had not released the name of the woman who died.
They said three people, including the man they said caused the crash, remained in the hospital.