A Las Vegas coroner ruled on Tuesday that the woman who former Raiders wide receiver Henry Ruggs III crashed into while driving intoxicated burned to death.
In early November, the 22-year-old former wide receiver allegedly drove intoxicated through a residential neighborhood at speeds of 156 mph in his Corvette sports car with his girlfriend in the passenger seat. When his car slammed into the rear of 23-year-old Tina Tintor’s Toyota Rav4 on a street with a 45mph speed limit, the woman reportedly “died from thermal injuries due to a motor vehicle collision,” according to a statement from Clark County Coroner Melanie Rouse.”
LAS VEGAS, NEVADA – NOVEMBER 22: Former Las Vegas Raiders player Henry Ruggs III appears in court at the Regional Justice Center on November 22, 2021 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Ruggs has been ordered to wear an ankle monitor to measure his alcohol level after he missed a court-ordered test. Ruggs faces DUI charges after a fatal car crash. (Photo by Bizuayehu Tesfaye-Pool/Getty Images)
“Other significant conditions contributing to her death were inhalation of products of combustion, fractures of the nasal bones, right sided ribs … left forearm and (chest),” the statement said. “The manner of her death was accidental.”
Ruggs, who was terminated by the Las Vegas Raiders hours after the car crash, remains on house arrest following a bail of $150,000. According to the Associated Press, he “has an ankle-wrapped GPS on one leg and an alcohol monitoring device on the other.”
Ruggs’ lawyers have said their client did not cause Tintor’s death and that firefighters were slow to put out the deadly fire.
LAS VEGAS, NEVADA – NOVEMBER 3: Former Las Vegas Raiders wide receiver Henry Ruggs III makes an initial appearance in Las Vegas Justice Court on November 3, 2021 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Ruggs is facing charges relating to a fiery vehicle crash early Tuesday in Las Vegas that left a woman dead and Ruggs and his female passenger injured. The photo is taken through a glass window. (Photo by Steve Marcus-Pool/Getty Images)
“The lawyers told a judge in a court document last month they found a witness who told them firefighters were slow to respond while flames consumed the car where Tintor and her dog, Max, died,” reported AP. “Other witnesses told police they heard screams and tried to rescue Tintor and her dog but were turned back by heat, flames, and smoke.”
However, Clark County spokesman Erik Pappa said in a statement last month that there were no “delays in response or in the attack on the fire” and that the vehicle was fully engulfed in flames by the time firefighters arrived.