‘Beloved’ 14-year-old fatally hit by car while biking, AZ cops say. Now, arrest made
A driver has been arrested about two months after a wreck that killed a 14-year-old boy on a bicycle, police in Arizona said.
Toxicology results indicate that the driver, from Prescott Valley, was impaired when he collided head-on with the teen cyclist on Nov. 12, 2024, the Prescott Valley Police Department said in a Jan. 16 Facebook post.
The driver was in a pickup truck, according to police.
He was arrested Jan. 15 and booked into jail related to the investigation of manslaughter and driving under the influence of drugs, police said.
McClatchy News isn’t naming him pending criminal charges being filed.
The 14-year-old cyclist was identified in a news report and online fundraiser as Gabriel Grande, a high school freshman and mountain biker.
Gabriel “was very smart, athletically gifted, always, he was an experienced biker,” his father told 12News after the wreck.
His mother said her son “just kept clocking all these medals and climbing up” in mountain biking, the outlet reported.
He’d recently competed in a state championship, the Arizona Cycling Association wrote in an Instagram post on Nov. 14, describing the teen as “beloved.”
In an online fundraiser, a family friend wrote that Gabriel was “a goofball at heart” and “a true light in this world.” He was “incredibly bright, determined, creative, and passionate,” the friend said, and “the Prescott Valley community and many around the country are devastated by this loss.”
Prescott Valley is about a 90-mile drive northwest from Phoenix.
This story was originally published January 16, 2025 at 2:43 PM with the headline "‘Beloved’ 14-year-old fatally hit by car while biking, AZ cops say. Now, arrest made."
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