Man killed when car slams into tree in Crown Point

A northwest Indiana man was killed Thursday morning when the car he was driving struck a tree in Crown Point.

Officers responding shortly before 6 a.m. for a report of a crash in the 8300 block of East 109th Avenue in Crown Point, Indiana, found a black 2202 Nissan Sentra facing east on the north side of the roadway, according to the Lake County sheriff’s office.

The car had crashed into a tree, police said.

The driver, 30-year-old George Gaydula Jr., who lived in the 1700 block of Beachview Court in Crown Point, was taken to Franciscan St. Anthony Health in Crown Point, where he was pronounced dead at 7:08 a.m., the Lake County coroner’s office said. His exact cause of death was pending an autopsy, but it was ruled an accident.

The 17-year-old boy sitting in the passenger seat was ejected from the car during the crash, police said. He declined medical treatment and was released to his parents at the scene.

The cause of the crash remains under investigation by the sheriff’s Traffic Reconstruction Unit.