New details released in crash that killed two Nicolet students

Halee Ludowise-Fischer

Jennifer Geren

The two Nicolet High School students who died in a car crash early Saturday appear to have sneaked out of their homes without their parents' knowledge shortly before the crash, according to a report by the Milwaukee County medical examiner's office released Monday.

The report made no mention of toxicology reports, which are pending.

According to the report:

Driver Halee Ludowise-Fischer and Jennifer Geren, both 15, were driving east on W. Good Hope Road in Ludowise-Fischer's mother's 2009 Mitsubishi shortly before 1 a.m. when a River Hills police officer noticed a taillight on the vehicle was out. He activated his lights and tried to pull the car over, but the driver sped off, running through two traffic lights. The officer turned off his lights and stopped the chase.

Shortly after, he saw sparks flying in the air when the girls' car struck a transformer.

Ludowise-Fischer drove for another half-mile and lost control of the vehicle, crossing over toward the westbound lane. She struck a stop sign on the northeast corner at N. Seneca Ave. in Glendale, then a utility pole. The car rolled onto the passenger side, and the hood wrapped around a tree less than a mile from Nicolet High School.

North Shore Fire Department rescue personnel tried to get into the car, where the teens were pinned. The two girls suffered fatal head injuries, investigators at the medical examiner's office ruled Monday. Both were pronounced dead at the scene.

Ludowise-Fischer had a learner's permit for driving.

Ludowise-Fischer's father told investigators he last spoke with his daughter at 10 p.m. Friday. She was supposed to be house sitting in Brown Deer for her mother, who wasn't home, he said.

"The two (Ludowise-Fischer and her father) were texting each other at midnight. She told him that she was not with anyone and was just at home," the medical examiner's report said.

Geren's mother told investigators her daughter had "experimented socially" with alcohol and said she thought her daughter had not been hanging out with Ludowise-Fischer for about a year.

The mother also told investigators she did not know whether her daughter had ever previously sneaked out of the house.

Police have not said what the girls were doing on the night of the crash.