7-year-old SC passenger dies when a DUI suspect crashes head-on into an SUV

They were on their way to eat pizza after basketball practice.

Seven year-old Aaliyah King and her 5-year-old friend rode along with the younger child’s grandmother in her SUV, driving down busy White Horse Road in Greenville County.

Sometime after 8 p.m. Monday, a car crossed from the opposing lane and struck the SUV head-on. Aaliyah was killed, her friend and his grandmother injured.

Aaliyah was in the back seat and and was wearing a seat belt.

The driver of the other car, Aydin Adil Oglu-Mammadov, 35, of Greenville, died as well.

Moments before the crash, he had been questioned in a Walmart parking lot by a Greenville County Sheriff’s deputy because the muffler on his Mercedes was scraping the ground, sending up sparks.

When the deputy, believing the man was under the influence of something, opened the car door, Oglu-Mammadov took off in his car, officials said. The deputy ran back to his car to try to find Oglu-Mammadov and then came upon the accident minutes later.

Greenville County Sheriff Hobart Lewis played video of the encounter from the deputy’s body camera at a press conference Wednesday to dispel the notion circulating in the community that the deadly crash occurred during a pursuit.

The man was fleeing, and the deputy was following, but Lewis said the deputy could not see the man’s car and didn’t know for sure he was going the right way until he came upon the scene.

The deputy gave first aid to Aaliyah, Lewis said.

Aaliyah was a second grade student at Grove Elementary in Piedmont in Greenville County.

Principal Joseph Stowe said most mornings he saw her walking happily into her upstairs classroom, ready for the day.

“She’d say, ‘Good morning Mr. Stowe,’ or sometimes a ‘hey,’ in that good old Southern charm way,” he said in an interview.

Aaliyah was an innocent girl with a sure kindness and sweet spirit, Stowe said.

Aaliyah has an older sibling who went through Grove and two who are still there, in fifth and third grade.

Their mother works at the day care where they go in the afternoons, Stowe said.

At the press conference, Lewis said the deputy, who he did not name, performed his duties professionally and by the book. The Sheriff’s Office of Professional Standards has already cleared the case, he said.

“He acted appropriately,” Lewis said of the deputy. “It’s a terrible situation.”

This story was originally published November 11, 2021 at 5:00 AM.