By admin 
Months after 22-year-old dance instructor Elinor Steffy was struck and killed by a car at a light rail station in Folsom, the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office said it would not file charges against the driver.
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But the legal saga surrounding Steffy’s death might not be over.
Steffy was struck shortly before 3 p.m. Jan. 22 by a Tesla Model 3 at the Iron Point Station. The District Attorney’s Office said the driver, a 21-year-old Rancho Cordova woman, had a medical condition at the time of the incident. A spokesperson for District Attorney Thien Ho said prosecutors decided not to file charges on March 30.
“After evaluating the full scope of the facts and circumstances, we determined there was insufficient evidence of criminal conduct and that the driver experienced a medical condition,” the DA’s Office wrote in a statement. “For that reason, we declined to file charges.”
Steffy’s mother filed a tort claim against the city of Folsom in early July, alleging the fatal crash was caused by inadequate safety precautions and pedestrian protections. Delcy Steffy requested more than $4.5 million in damages, including lost business income from her restaurant, future income loss and funeral expenses.
The claim, a typical step before filing a lawsuit, was rejected by the city last week.
Reports shed further light on fatal crash
The claim, which Folsom Police Cmdr. Andrew Bates provided to The Sacramento Bee on Thursday, includes reports associated with the crash, offering more detail about what occurred.
A few minutes before the crash, the Tesla turned west onto Iron Point Road at Willard Drive near the Intel campus, according to traffic camera footage cited in the crash report. The report also cites dash camera footage showing the Tesla continued west on Iron Point Road before stopping at a red light at Las Alhambras Road, roughly a block from the crash site near the Folsom Premium Outlets.
The driver was stopped at the red light for about 15 seconds and remained there for another six seconds after the light turned green. The Tesla then began “accelerating forward at a seemingly normal rate” before veering off the roadway and striking several curbs, another vehicle, a tree and Elinor Steffy.
Steffy lived in Sacramento and was a popular hip-hop dance instructor at nearby Hawkins School of Performing Arts, about a mile from Iron Point Station. Sacramento Regional Transit video footage showed Steffy had just gotten off a bus and was walking through the station parking lot when she was struck and killed, according to the crash report.
The Tesla came to rest partially on the elevated platform beside the light rail tracks. A speed analysis determined the Tesla was traveling 63 mph, exceeding the posted 45 mph speed limit.
“The car went straight through the lot and seemed like it flew over the other parked vehicles and landed where it is now,” one witness told police, as noted in the report. “I did not see the driver hit their brakes or attempt to swerve. It happened so suddenly, it was like the driver lost control of the vehicle or lost consciousness.”
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Sacramento Regional Transit estimated the incident caused about $34,800 in repair costs. A ramp railing was damaged during the collision, and the agency said it hoped to fund repairs through reimbursement from the insurance provider for the party investigators determine was responsible for the incident.
Read more DA declines charges in crash that killed Elinor Steffy. Folsom could face lawsuit
As of recent weeks, clear indications remained at Iron Point Station that something out of the ordinary had occurred.
A portion of the metal railing on the raised platform had been replaced with a wooden section that appeared to have been recently spray-painted and had two bunches of artificial flowers attached to it.
A rare occurrence
Statistically speaking, Steffy’s death was almost unheard of.
Folsom is relatively safe for pedestrians, with 82 pedestrian-involved crashes on public roads from 2016 through 2025, according to UC Berkeley’s Transportation Injury Mapping System. The city of Sacramento, by contrast, had 2,498 such crashes in the same 10-year span.
Adjusting for population differences, Sacramento had about 4.5 times as many crashes involving pedestrians as Folsom over that period.
Deaths related to public transit also are far less frequent than those involving private vehicle travel. Data from the National Safety Council showed that over a recent 10-year stretch, there were about 20 times more deaths among passengers in cars as opposed to trains.
Still, while the crash that killed Steffy was highly unusual, it might have been preventable, according to the claim. The claim states that Steffy’s death was caused by a variety of factors, including “the failure to provide appropriate barriers or other reasonably necessary protective measures to safeguard pedestrians and waiting passengers from errant vehicular traffic.”
Iron Point Station is situated along Folsom Boulevard, where cars travel at freeway-adjacent speeds after exiting Highway 50. Train tracks separate the station from Folsom Boulevard, though there is no barrier to stop cars.
Some experts, including Julia Griswold, director of UC Berkeley’s Safe Transportation Research and Education Center, questioned the efficacy of adding further protection at the station.
“If you proactively prevented every scenario where a crash like this could happen, I’m not sure that’s the best use of scarce funds,” Griswold said.
But Griswold also acknowledged the tragedy of Steffy’s death.
“It’s like really tragic thinking that that poor passenger could have been probably a few feet over and been rattled, but completely fine,” Griswold said.
This story was originally published July 20, 2026 at 5:00 AM with the headline “DA declines charges in crash that killed Elinor Steffy. Folsom could face lawsuit.”
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