Background: Footage captures a black Dodge Challenger T-boning a white Chevrolet Sonic and causing it to spin out (WMC/YouTube/Central Exchange). Inset top: Julio Hernandez (Shelby County Sheriff”s Office). Inset bottom: Ava Christopher (Memorial Park Funeral and Cemetary).
A man in Tennessee accused of killing a beloved college student by driving a stolen car through a red light and T-boning her vehicle has admitted to causing her death.
Julio Hernandez, 21, pleaded guilty to several charges on Tuesday, including reckless vehicular homicide, leaving the scene of an accident involving a death, and driving without a license, according to court records and the Shelby County District Attorney’s Office. The charges stemmed from a summer 2023 crash in which 20-year-old Ava Christopher was killed.
On July 25, 2023, just after midnight, Christopher was driving a white Chevrolet Sonic eastbound on Central Avenue in Memphis, an arrest affidavit reviewed by Law&Crime states. At the same time, Hernandez was driving a Dodge Challenger southbound on Cooper Street, and he “disregarded the red light” at the intersection.
Video footage obtained by local NBC affiliate WMC shows a white car traveling at a relatively low rate of speed toward a green light when suddenly a black car flies into the frame and strikes the white vehicle. Both vehicles spin, with the white vehicle coming to a stop when the front of it collides with a nearby pole.
Hernandez was driving 88 mph in a 40 mph zone at the time of the crash, the affidavit states.
Authorities said Hernandez had a passenger in the vehicle with him when he crashed into Christopher, and they left the scene “immediately” after the crash. First responders reached Christopher and transported her to an area hospital, but she was pronounced dead.
As loved ones mourned Christopher — who was about to enter her junior year at the University of Memphis, per her obituary — authorities had not yet charged someone in her death. But they continued to investigate.
A witness identified Hernandez to police as the man seen on a video walking away from the crash, according to the affidavit. Investigators had also learned that the Dodge Challenger involved in the crash was reported stolen out of Southaven, Mississippi, prior to the collision.
Authorities said that the original rims from the Dodge Challenger were missing from the vehicle at the time of the crash, and on Nov. 16, 2023, an officer spotted Hernandez driving another vehicle with those rims on it. He was detained and “admitted to driving the stolen Dodge Challenger at the time of the fatal crash,” the court document reads.
Memphis Police Sergeant Marcus Mosby, who detained Hernandez and was the lead investigator in the case, testified that Hernandez “gave me a full confession,” WMC reported.
“He walked away, he said he was afraid cause he thought the witness who witnessed the crash had a gun. He said that he was very apologetic. He admitted to everything,” Mosby said.
Hernandez was released on bond not long after his arrest in November 2023, but he was indicted on charges, including reckless vehicular homicide, in February 2025.
The defendant is scheduled to be sentenced on March 25.
Christopher was further remembered in her obituary as someone who “LOVED BIG” and “adored her friends, family, horse ‘Ozzi’, calico kitty ‘Jazzy’ as well as all of our family pets.”
“Ava loved everyone from all walks of life,” the tribute also said. “She believed in acceptance, tolerance and love. She packed more love, humor, knowledge, moxie, and experiences into her short 20 years than many of us do in a much longer lifetime.”
