Student killed in one-vehicle crash

A Clovis High School student was killed in a one-car accident Thursday at the intersection of Curry Road 11 and Curry Road N.

According to a New Mexico State Police report, William R. “Billy” Mason, 18, was traveling east on Curry Road 11, a dirt road, shortly after noon in a 1985 Honda Prelude. The car entered a soft dirt embankment, left the roadway and went into a broadside skid, the report said.

The vehicle rolled two and one half times and came to rest on its top, the report said.

Curry County Sheriff’s deputies said Mason was dead at the scene. But he was officially pronounced dead at by Office of the Medical Investigator Bill Blankenship at 2 p.m. Thursday at Steed-Todd Funeral Home, the report said.

New Mexico State Police Lt. R. W. Durham said a Clovis Fire Department ambulance responded to the accident and pulled Mason from the car, which caught on fire a few minutes later. Durham said the cause of death appeared to have been trauma to the head.

Mason had just finished his junior year at Clovis, Durham said.

There were no witnesses to the accident. Mason was wearing a seat belt. Speed may have been a contributing factor to the accident, Durham said.