The San Benito County District Attorney’s Office charged the
sole survivor of last fall’s fiery crash that killed three
Hollister teens with one charge of receiving stolen property,
according to the girl’s attorney.
Hollister – The San Benito County District Attorney’s Office charged the sole survivor of last fall’s fiery crash that killed three Hollister teens with one charge of receiving stolen property, according to the girl’s attorney.
The 14-year-old minor, who the Free Lance is not naming because she is a juvenile, faces one misdemeanor charge of stealing the Jaguar the group crashed while fleeing the California Highway Patrol last October, according to her
attorney Arthur Cantu. If convicted, she could spend up to one year in juvenile hall, according to the state penal code.
“We know (she) is innocent of the charge,” said the girl’s mother. “She wasn’t the one who entered the garage.”
The charge was filed late last week but the family didn’t retain Cantu’s services until Tuesday, he said.
“These charges should have never been filed. This poor little girl wants to go on with her life,” Cantu said. “To charge her criminally for stuff she didn’t do – I think the prosecution’s office has lost their moral compass.”
District Attorney John Sarsfield would not confirm or deny that his office charged the girl with a crime because she is a juvenile.
“We’re not saying we have, we’re not saying we haven’t,” Sarsfield said. “We’re not saying anything at all.”
The accident took the life of Albert Andrew Hernandez, 13, Armando Limas, 16, and Vanessa Jimenez, 13, after the group fled from a California Highway Patrol officer in a stolen Jaguar and crashed into a power pole on Fairview and Shore roads. The force of the collision launched the car into the air where it overturned and burst into flames.
The survivor was thrown through the windshield of the car and suffered a fractured vertebrae, facial lacerations, a collapsed lung and burns to one side of her body. The other teens were trapped inside the car where they died from smoke inhalation, burns and blunt force trauma, according to the coroner.
Limas’ mother, Karin Ordonez, was unavailable for comment, and his aunt, Dina Garcia, declined comment. Jimenez’s family did not return phone calls, but Amelia Hernandez said the girl’s fate is ultimately up to the district attorney and a judge.
“I don’t know how I feel right now. It’s been hard,” Hernandez said. “I don’t wish her wrong, I just wish my kid would have made it, too.”
The survivor’s mother said her daughter is still in recovery from her extensive injuries and is being home-schooled because she isn’t physically or emotionally able to go back to school. The girl received a major skin graft to her right leg and still has scars along the entire right side of her body – from her feet to her back, her mother said.
“Everything has completely changed. She has to wear garments for a year to try to get the skin flat. She’ll never be able to wear skirts or shorts or little shirts – nothing like what these young girls wear. She has to always wear a sweater, she can’t wear a tank top,” her mother said. “She cries all the time. She says, ‘It’s my fault my friends are gone,’ because she’s the only one who survived.”
The CHP’s initial investigation revealed that Jimenez and the survivor stole a 2001 Jaguar from a friend’s mom sometime in the early afternoon of Oct. 4, 2004, picked up Limas and Hernandez and took the car on a joyride through Hollister and surrounding cities in the hours leading up to the accident.
However, the girl’s family denies the CHP’s claims and said the teen did not participate in the theft of the car. The girl’s mother said Jimenez and another girl took the car that belonged to Hollister resident Wendy Cravens, but her daughter believed they had permission from Cravens’ teenage daughter to drive the car. Although the CHP’s Multidisciplinary Accident Investigation Team (MAIT) conducted an in-depth investigation into the crash, the girl’s mother said investigators interviewed her daughter soon after the crash while she was still in the hospital, but never after she was released.
However, CHP spokesman Matt Ramirez said investigators did interview the girl after she was released but she was uncooperative. The Free Lance has requested a copy of the MAIT investigation through the California Public Records Act.
The CHP believes Limas was driving at the time of the accident, and fled from police either because he was trying to join a gang or because he was on probation and afraid if he was caught with a stolen car he would be sent to jail.
After an officer pulled the group over for driving erratically late on a Monday evening, the CHP believes Limas, who originally was in the back seat but hopped into the driver’s seat when they were stopped, turned off the lights and sped away at speeds up to 100 mph before crashing into a power pole in the parking lot of Denice & Filice Packing Co. around 10:30pm.
The survivor is scheduled to appear in court on May 9 for an arraignment, and Cantu said he hopes to get the charge dismissed.
“She could (go to jail), but she won’t, not if I can help it,” Cantu said. “I am speechless to what this little girl did other than being in the vehicle, being injured and a victim. She didn’t drive the vehicle, she didn’t take the vehicle, she was just a passenger.”
Erin Musgrave covers public safety for the Free Lance. Reach her at 637-5566, ext. 336 or em*******@fr***********.com
