Driver kills two college cyclists in Tennessee, officials say

By MICHAEL LEVENSON

A driver was charged with vehicular homicide Wednesday after officials said he struck members of a college cycling team, killing two, as they were training on a mountain highway in northeast Tennessee.

The crash happened around 9 a.m., when the driver of a passenger car struck members of the Milligan University cycling team on Highway 19 near Simerly Creek Road in Carter County, Tennessee, officials said.

Milligan University, a Christian school in Milligan, Tennessee, near Johnson City, said two sophomores, Haylan Engdahl and Brayden Rogers, were killed. Seven other members of the cycling team were taken to Johnson City Medical Center, two of them by helicopter.

Four of the students were in critical condition in the surgical intensive care unit Wednesday evening; two were in stable condition; and one had been released, said Dr. Bracken Burns, the trauma medical director at Johnson City Medical Center, at a news conference.

In an emotional video message, Stephen Waers, the president of Milligan University, asked for prayers from the campus community and said that pastors and counselors would be available to assist grieving students.

“We need to be gathered together, gathered together around Jesus, and we need to help our brothers and sisters bear burdens that are too great for any one person to carry alone,” he said.

Eleven Milligan University cyclists were on a training ride together when the crash occurred, Waers said.

Maj. Roy Brown of the Tennessee Highway Patrol said at a news conference Wednesday afternoon that a large number of emergency workers responded to the scene. Officials declined to release details about the crash, which Brown said remained under investigation.

The speed limit on that part of the road is 50 mph, according to the Tennessee Department of Transportation.

“We know the families and Milligan University deeply want answers, and we want to provide those answers,” Brown said.

Steven R. Finney, district attorney general for Carter County, said the driver, John Benfield, 69, of Newland, North Carolina, had been charged with two counts of vehicular homicide by recklessness and five counts of aggravated assault by vehicle by recklessness. He said Benfield was being booked into jail.

“This is an elite cycling team,” Finney said. “It’s not a bunch of those club guys getting together to ride. They know what they’re doing. They rode in a peloton. One of the boys just won last weekend in one of the local races.”

Milligan University, which has about 1,200 students, is about 11 miles from the scene of the crash in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

In May, the university announced that its cycling team had won the men’s team time trial national championship at the USA Cycling Collegiate Road Nationals in Madison, Wisconsin.