Stillwater couple killed in wreck near Memphis.

Saturday, January 25th 2003, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) _ Three people including an 8-year-old boy were killed when a car plowed into a van and some of its passengers on the Hernando DeSoto Bridge over the Mississippi River.

The blue Ford minivan with Oklahoma license plates had stopped near the Front Street exit of eastbound Interstate 40 on the bridge at about 3:45 p.m. Friday.

``The heard a noise and thought they had car trouble,'' Henry Posey of the Memphis Fire Department told The Commercial Appeal newspaper.

Some of the passengers were standing on the bridge near the van when a gray Plymouth Reliant hit them and the van. The boy was thrown over the bridge rail and landed partially on water and partially on Mud Island, a resort area with restaurants, a museum and other attractions. A bystander recovered the body.

``The scene was pretty chaotic when we got there,'' Posey told the newspaper.

Killed were Dakoto Rivero, 8 of Jasper, Texas; Jason Doyeto, 27, of Stillwater, Okla.; and his wife Judith Doyeto, 27. Juan Rivero, 32, of Jasper, Texas, was listed in critical condition at Regional Medical Center at Memphis.

Van driver Marcos Rivero, of Tulsa, Okla., the brother of Judith Doyeto, was not injured. Neither was 52-year-old Delfena Rivero of Altus, Okla., or a man who hadn't yet been identified by police.

It wasn't clear what relation the Riveros were to each other.

The driver of the Reliant, 38-year-old Mark Allen Richards of Tyronza, Ark., was being treated at Regional Medical Center at Memphis for non-critical injuries. The crash was being investigated, and no decision had been made about possible charges against Richards, said police Lt. Ron Fittes.

At least six people have been killed on or approaching the Hernando DeSoto Bridge over the past six years, with stalled vehicles usually a factor.