Calif. BMW driver faces murder charge after alleged 100 mph DUI crash

A Long Beach man has been arrested on a murder charge three months after Huntington Beach Police Department said he slammed into another vehicle while driving more than 100 mph while under the influence. 

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Lukas McHargue, 24, is accused of killing 53-year-old Heather “Candy Corn” Lewis on April 15 while on the iconic Pacific Coast Highway near Bolsa Chica State Beach. McHargue was driving his white BMW 328i when he allegedly rear-ended McHargue’s silver Kia Soul.

Police said the force of the collision sent Lewis’ vehicle off the roadway and into the Bolsa Chica Wetlands, where it overturned and became partially submerged, trapping her inside. She was pulled from the vehicle by officers and Huntington Beach Fire Department lifeguards. She died from her injuries after being taken to a nearby hospital.

A week after the fatal crash, the car club that Lewis was a member of mourned her death. The Beach City Classics car club called Lewis “Candy Corn” in a nod to her orange-and-yellow painted nails and told CBS LA (KCBS-TV) she was a group fixture who routinely stayed behind to watch over members’ prized classic cars. 

“We lost a sister,” fellow club member and friend Lavinia Rosen told CBS LA at the time. “We lost somebody that was so unimaginably loving and caring.” 

During the subsequent investigation, police found that McHargue had been warned that impaired driving could kill someone and had acknowledged that risk, officials said. 

“Driving in excess of 100 mph, at more than double the posted speed limit and with an alcohol level more than double the legal limit is not an accident,” Huntington Beach police Chief Eric Parra said in a statement. “This was a series of reckless choices that ended an innocent woman’s life.”

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Based on those findings, the Orange County District Attorney’s Office charged McHargue with one count of murder under California law, which allows prosecutors to pursue murder charges in fatal DUI cases when a driver knowingly disregards the danger impaired driving poses to human life. 

Detectives with the Huntington Beach Police Department’s special investigation bureau and major accident investigation team arrested McHargue in Oceanside on Wednesday. He was booked into the Orange County Jail, where he was being held without bail, KTLA-TV reported. SFGATE could not confirm that he was still in custody Thursday. Requests for further details from the Huntington Beach Police Department and the Orange County District Attorney’s Office were not immediately answered by the time of publication.

The investigation remains ongoing. Police are asking anyone who witnessed the crash or the events leading up to it to contact Huntington Beach traffic investigator Vishal Rattanchandani at 714-536-5231.