By Jane Prendergast
Enquirer staff writer

Apartment manager Henry Baker witnessed the accident that killed his tenant Gloria Valles on Monday. "This really hurts,'' Baker said. "You see people trying to make a living. It only happens to the good ones, it seems to me.'' The Enquirer/GLENN HARTONG

WESTWOOD - The 18-year-old driver accused of fatally hitting a woman Monday in what police are calling a road-rage incident was driving without a license and has been convicted six times of traffic-related offenses.

Zachery J. Costa of Green Township cried Tuesday morning in court where he was charged with aggravated vehicular homicide and leaving the scene of the accident that killed Gloria Valles.

Police say he was driving the black Honda Accord that sped through a red light on Glenway Avenue and hit Valles, a mother from El Salvador who was walking across Glenway in a crosswalk.

Witnesses said the driver of the Honda was racing with a red Neon just before the crash, but police discounted that Tuesday.

Gloria Valles

Zachery J. Costa

Cincinnati Police Lt. Robert Hungler said the driver of the Neon called Cheviot police after the crash, identified himself and said he was trying to avoid the Honda, which had been tailgating him. When the Neon stopped at the traffic light at Glenway and Midway avenues, the Honda sped around the Neon to pass, Hungler said. That's when the Honda hit Valles.

Court records say Costa told police he was speeding at the time of the crash and sped away from the accident because he was scared.

Costa jumped out of his car and witnesses, who followed him, caught him at Ferguson Avenue and held him there for police.

Costa's Ohio driving record shows six prior convictions, half of them for speeding, between October 2002 and December 2003. The record did not indicate when he got his license, but he turned 16 in February 2002. The other convictions were for failing to wear his seat belt, disregarding a traffic control device and driving without due regard on private property.

Records also show Costa has lost his driver's license three times in 14 months. His license was most recently suspended by Butler County Juvenile Courton Dec. 2 for one year.

Costa remained jailed Tuesday in lieu of $150,000 bond. He told police he was driving 50 mph - 15 mph over the posted speed limit.

Crime scene tape remained tied on the utility pole where Valles waited for the light to change shortly after 5 p.m. She'd made it about halfway across the four-lane street when the Honda hit her, throwing her into the air, then down onto the street an estimated 50 yards away.

Her boyfriend, with whom she lived in a $395-a-month furnished apartment, had crossed the street ahead of her and watched as she was hit. He returned to the apartment Tuesday and told landlord Henry Baker that he would not be living there anymore.

"This really hurts,'' Baker said. "You see people trying to make a living. It only happens to the good ones, it seems to me.''

Valles worked at the Chipolte restaurant nearby on Glenway. Employees there wore black ribbons on their T-shirts Tuesday.

The strip of Glenway is a problem spot for fast drivers, said traffic Lt. Robert Hungler. In response to complaints, the traffic unit set up a speed monitor on Glenway near the Western Hills High School ball fields last week. The monitor flashes the speed a passing motorist is going. That monitor was not working Tuesday because its batteries were low, Hungler said.

"That whole area up there is a speeding problem,'' he said. "People just don't go 25 anymore.''

E-mail jprendergast@enquirer.com