2 immigrant teens killed in hit-and-run

AMARILLO, Texas (AP) - Two refugee families in the Texas Panhandle are mourning the loss their teenage daughters, victims of an apparent hit-and-run accident.

Irafasha Vestina, 14, and Violette Ntawurusimba, 13, natives of Tanzania who became friends in Amarillo, were known for walking everywhere together.

They were walking to Irafasha's home after eating with her brother about 8 p.m. Sunday when a pickup truck driven by 19-year-old Gillermo Flores hit them, police said.

Flores was jailed Tuesday on $100,000 bond on two counts of causing an accident involving death. No lawyer was listed for him.

The Amarillo Globe-News reported that Flores initially fled the scene, but his family brought him to police. Police do not believe alcohol was a factor.

The girls' families, who had both fled political unrest in Tanzania years earlier, became friends last year after both moved to Amarillo. The girls attended the same middle school and sang together in a local church choir. Their families had attended services that morning, relatives said.

Violette "liked to laugh and make people laugh," her mother Ndayishimiye Munaria said.

A local community organization was trying to raise money to help the families pay funeral expenses.