A 23-year-old Mays Landing woman was killed early on Sunday morning, November 8, in a two-vehicle crash on Route 40 in Hamilton Township, Atlantic County, after her car lost control, struck the rear of another car and then hit a tree, according to the Hamilton Township Police Department report carried by DownBeach.

Source: DownBeach

Police identified the woman who died as Giana Fortson, 23, of Mays Landing. She was pronounced dead at the scene from traumatic injuries. She was the only person in her vehicle, and no other injuries were reported in the crash.

What Happened on Route 40

According to the police report, Fortson was driving westbound on Route 40 in a 2008 Toyota Scion at about 6:18 a.m. — before sunrise on a Sunday morning — when she lost control of the vehicle near Strand Avenue in the Mays Landing section of Hamilton Township.

The Scion rear-ended a 2025 Nissan Versa driven by 20-year-old Ashlie Guevara Angel of Pleasantville, police said. After the first impact, Fortson's car left the roadway and struck a tree. Angel's Versa also left the highway and came to rest in a resident's yard on the eastbound side of the road.

Police said Fortson was not wearing a seatbelt at the time of the crash. Investigators have not yet said why the Scion lost control, and no cause — speed, road conditions, distraction or a medical issue — has been announced. Nothing in the police account released so far assigns fault beyond describing the sequence of the collision.

The Response and the Investigation

Route 40 was shut down for about four hours while the scene was documented and cleared. The Township of Hamilton Rescue Squad and AtlantiCare Paramedics responded alongside Hamilton Township police, and the Atlantic County Prosecutor's Office and the New Jersey Department of Transportation assisted at the scene — the prosecutor's involvement is the standard Atlantic County practice for a fatal crash investigation.

The crash remains under investigation. Anyone who witnessed the collision or was travelling on Route 40 near Strand Avenue around 6:18 a.m. on Sunday is asked to call Sgt. James Jacobi of the Hamilton Township Police Department at 609-625-2700, extension 541.

Background: Route 40 and Mays Landing

Route 40, known locally along much of this stretch as the Black Horse Pike corridor's companion east-west artery, is one of Atlantic County's main roads, carrying local and through traffic between the Atlantic City area, Mays Landing, Buena and points west toward the Delaware Memorial Bridge. Mays Landing, the Hamilton Township community where Fortson lived, is the seat of Atlantic County, and Hamilton Township is the county's largest municipality by land area — a largely wooded, spread-out township where many residents drive long distances on two-lane state highways for work, including pre-dawn shifts.

For Punjabi and other South Asian families living across South Jersey — and for the truckers and delivery drivers who run Route 40 and the parallel Atlantic City Expressway in the early hours — the crash is a reminder of the particular risk of the pre-dawn hours: darkness, empty roads that invite speed, and long rural stretches between the shore towns and the Philadelphia suburbs. New Jersey treats seatbelt use as a primary-offence law, meaning an officer can stop a vehicle for an unbelted driver alone; police noted in this case that the driver who died was not belted, a detail investigators record in every fatal crash report because ejection and impact forces are so often decisive.

What Happens Next

Investigators will complete the crash reconstruction and the Atlantic County Prosecutor's Office review that accompanies a fatal collision, which will establish the official cause of the loss of control. Police have not announced any summonses or charges, and none are indicated in the account released so far — this was reported as a single-driver loss-of-control crash. Any further detail, including the final investigation findings, will come from the Hamilton Township Police Department, and the witness line — 609-625-2700 ext. 541 — remains the channel police have given the public.