Jesse Arreola, 31, died when the driver of the band’s chartered bus ran a stop sign, throwing Arreola into a ditch, authorities said. The bus then ran over Arreola, said Veronica Diaz of the Calhoun County Sheriff’s Department.

The driver apparently was distracted by a conversation with Arreola when the accident occurred around 1:45 p.m. along Farm Road 3084, Diaz said.

The other five bus passengers suffered only minor injuries and were released at the scene, she said. They are James, Johnny and George Arreola – fellow band members and brothers of the victim – along with the driver and an unidentified passenger. The driver’s name was not released.

Los Palominos performed Saturday night in Port Lavaca, and the band was on its way to another concert in Kenedy scheduled for the next day, said Lupita Flores, spokeswoman for Los Angeles-based Fonovisa, which carries the band’s label through its Houston office.

The three surviving brothers went home to Uvalde, Texas, after the accident, Flores said.

“They’re just in a state of shock,” she said.

The group won for best Tejano performance at the 1999 Grammy Awards for “Por Eso Te Amo,” which also won the Tejano category the same year in the first Latin Grammy Awards. Los Palominos received comeback album of the year last year at the 20th annual Tejano Music Awards.

The brothers began singing in 1984 under the name Los Tremendos, but switched their name to Los Palominos in 1995 with a new producer, Armando Lichtenberger Jr.

The band signed with Fonovisa in September 2000 after a stint with Sony. Its latest album, Obsession, was released at the end of 2000 and produced a hit single, “Te Quiero Mas.”

Jesse Arreola had recently overcome a bout with leukemia, said Lichtenberger, who described his friend as a prankster.

“He had an extreme passion for music; music was his everything,” he said. “In public he was very quiet … behind closed doors, he was pretty much the life of the party.”