Injured teen, brothers recovering after reckless driver plunges them into canal
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Crowdsourcing and camera review helped identify a Kia Soul and a suspect.
- Three teens survived flip into canal; boys bruised, girl’s knee injured.
- Mother’s Facebook post aided investigators in identifying a hit-and-run suspect.
It’s a miracle Marie Garside’s three oldest children are alive today, she said, after they were forced off Interstate 10 in Harrison County by a driver who fled, with their car flipping three times and landing on the hood in a water-filled canal.
Garside, who owns Long Beach Screen Printing with the children’s stepfather, was determined to find the driver. She posted about the Friday afternoon crash that same evening on Facebook, asking anyone with information to contact her. The internet came through.
Thanks to crowdsourcing, Garside said, the Kia Soul that endangered her children has been located in Brookhaven. A suspect is under investigation, the Mississippi Highway Patrol confirmed Wednesday morning.
“This is not something I was just going to let happen,” Garside said. “My children are very lucky to have their lives. By the grace of God, he had his hands around that vehicle.”
Bay High teens forced from road
The teens had just gotten out of school at Bay High, Garside said, and were headed to the screen printing shop, where her boys were going to work. Garside asked that they be identified by their ages because they are minors. The boys, who both play football for the Bay High Tigers, are 15 and 16 years old.
Her daughter Mariah Gill, an adult at 18, was driving. She planned to drop off her brothers and go hang out with a friend that Friday evening.
Then she saw the Kia in the passing lane of Interstate 10 eastbound. Gill, driving a Chevrolet Impala, was in the slower eastbound lane. Witnesses messaged Garside on Facebook, with one saying a red Kia Soul was swerving in and out of lanes as it passed other vehicles. The Kia then pulled up beside the Impala and, according to the witness, was trying to force the Impala off the road.
Mariah told her mother what happened next.
“She told the boys, ‘This car is trying to ram us off the road.’ She warned them,” Garside said, “so they were very alert to what was going on. At some point, she told them to hold on.”
Her daughter lost control of the car. It hit a fence, flipped three times and landed upside down in the canal, Garside said. Water started filling the car. The teens were frantically trying to beat their way out the doors. As the 16-year-old tried to open the back driver’s side door, a passerby who stopped to help pulled on the door from the outside. It swung open.
Two passersby, James and J.D. Durant, Garside said, helped the boys out. Mariah, now swimming, was also pulled out the passenger side door.
Without the Durants, Garside said, “I don’t think these kids would be alive today.”
Three teens suffered injuries in wreck
All three teenagers were injured. The 16-year-old broke a facial bone and both boys are badly bruised. Mariah’s right knee was severely injured and required surgery. She is home from the hospital, with an appointment scheduled for Thursday to find out whether she will need more surgery. Her mother expects Mariah’s recovery to be lengthy.
They had planned to pick up Mariah’s class ring and senior dress this weekend. Her mom just hopes she can walk for graduation.
Garside said emergency responders, including the highway patrol, Harrison County Sheriff’s Department and emergency medical staff, were amazing and she appreciated their help.
She just hopes someone is arrested soon. A witness followed the Kia, seeing others had stopped to assist at the wreck scene. The Kia exited at Menge Avenue before getting away, the witness told Garside. Garside rode along Menge, locating traffic cameras. She talked with law enforcement officers who used the cameras to identify the Kia from its license plate.
“I was not going to stop until we got answers,” Garside said.
Master Sgt. Adam Dedeaux, an senior crash reconstructionist with the highway patrol, and Chief Deputy Craig Necaise of the Harrison County Sheriff’s Department pursued the case, she said.
“They took it upon themselves to investigate and that’s how we’re getting justice.”
Garside says she has seven children. The three in the car are her oldest from her first marriage. Her daughter, lying injured in the hospital, kept reliving the accident.
“It keeps replaying in her mind,” her mom said. “She kept waking up, ‘I just want to hear my brothers. I want to hear their voices.’ “ Her mother assured her the boys were going to be alright.
This story was originally published March 11, 2026 at 2:14 PM.
