Ulysses Teen Hospitalized After Crash Near Denver

CONIFER, Colo. (AP) – Three teenagers from a Kansas military school were killed and another was injured when their pickup crashed in the foothills outside Denver.

Eighteen-year-old Jake Whitting, of Glen Head, New York; 19-year-old John Yoder, of Denver; and 16-year-old Akinwumi "AJ" Ricketts, of Nigeria, died after Colorado State Patrol investigators say Whitting lost control, went off the road and crashed into a creek south of Conifer on Tuesday.

A fourth cadet, 17-year-old Marshall Otter, of Ulysses, Kansas, was hospitalized with serious injuries.

Whitting had just graduated from St. John’s Military School in Salina on Saturday as class valedictorian and the others are current students.

Investigators suspect that alcohol and drugs played a role in the crash.