‘Childhood sweethearts’ die in car crash minutes after getting married

‘“I had to sit there and watch my two babies die,’ says mother of groom

A newlywed couple were killed in a car crash while leaving the Texan courthouse (KPMG)

A pair of “childhood sweethearts” were killed in a car crash moments after they were married.

Harley Morgan, 19, and Rhiannon Boudreaux, 20, were still in their wedding dress and tuxedo when they collided with a pickup truck, metres from the courthouse where they had tied the knot, said police in Orange, a small city to the east of Houston, Texas.

They were pronounced dead at the scene by the same judge who married them.

“I’m talking five minutes [after] ‘you may kiss the bride’,” said Orange Police captain Keith Longlois.

He added: “The family was right behind them. They were all going out to go to wherever they were going to have their reception."

Mr Longlois said they were “childhood sweethearts” who had decided to be married by a popular Justice of the Peace Joy Dubose-Simonton.

He said the groom was driving when he tried to exit the driveway onto a five-lane motorway.

A pickup truck pulling a trailer carrying a heavy tractor slammed into their vehicle.

The force of the crash was so great that witnesses said the car flipped multiple times before coming to rest in a ditch.

The man driving the truck sustained no injuries, the KFDM news channel reported.

The other driver was not identified but Mr Longlois said he was cooperating with the investigation and there was no sign of wrongdoing.

Drug and alcohol tests would be conducted, he said.

“I had to sit there and watch my two babies die,” the mother of the groom, LaShawna Morgan, told the Beaumont Enterprise.

“Please go home and hug your loved ones tonight,” Ms Morgan said, standing by the motorway. “Do not go to bed angry.”

Additional reporting by Associated Press