The remaining survivor of an explosive accident Monday night
that left three Hollister teens dead will likely face juvenile
charges for auto theft and possession of stolen property, according
to the California Highway Patrol.
Hollister – The remaining survivor of an explosive accident Monday night that left three Hollister teens dead will likely face juvenile charges for auto theft and possession of stolen property, according to the California Highway Patrol.
And while members of the community continue to grapple with the loss, new details concerning the teens’ activities leading up to the accident continue to unfold.
The 13-year-old girl, whose name is being withheld because she is a juvenile, remains hospitalized in a doctor-induced coma with facial lacerations, a collapsed lung, burns to one side of her body and a fractured vertebrae at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, said CHP Officer Terry Mayes.
Vanessa Jimenez, 13, Albert Andrew Hernandez, 13, and Armando Limas, 16, burned to death in a stolen Jaguar on Fairview and Shore roads in the parking lot of Denice & Filice Packing Co. after fleeing from police around 10:30pm, according to the CHP.
Friends, witnesses and people who had never met the victims were trying to make sense of the accident at a make-shift memorial set up at the accident site Wednesday afternoon.
Father Rudy Ruiz of Sacred Heart Catholic Church attended to bless the site at the request of three women who were working at the packing company the night of the accident and needed some spiritual support, he said.
“They heard their cries and felt so helpless. But these children were blessed because three women of faith, who are also mothers, where there. These children did not die alone,” Ruiz said. “When things like this happen we always ask ‘Why?’ But we have to ask, ‘What can we learn from this?’ If we learn something it would not have been in vain.”
The incident began sometime early Monday afternoon when Jimenez and the survivor got out of school and stole a 2001 Jaguar and assorted diamond jewelry from the home of Hollister resident Wendy Cravens, said CHP Officer Terry Mayes. The girls had attended a slumber party at the home on Las Palmas Drive the night before, Mayes said.
Mayes said Cravens told the CHP she discovered the car was stolen when she returned home from work around 7:30pm, but didn’t report the theft to Hollister police until 10:44pm, according to the police log.
Cravens declined to comment on the incident without the presence of her attorney, Victor Vertner of San Jose.
“She was talking to parents, perhaps, trying to get it back,” Vertner said. “Who knows what kind of civil liability will be going on. We’ll have no comment until we see reports.”
Juli Cooper, Limas’ aunt, said Cravens drove by her brother’s home, where Limas was living, and Limas’ mother’s house sometime after 1pm, looking for the teens.
Cooper said Cravens knew Jimenez was Limas’ ex-girlfriend, and drove by the two locations because she thought the group may have been there.
Cravens never found the foursome, and sometime between 3pm and 5pm they drove to San Jose, Cooper said. She didn’t know what they did there or how long they stayed, but on their way home they stopped in Gilroy at a friend’s house and were on their way back to Hollister when they were pulled over, she said.
The teens were pulled over at 10:28pm by CHP Officer Matt Kostielney. As the officer was getting out of his car to approach the vehicle, the driver slid into the back seat and the passenger in the back seat got into the driver’s seat, Mayes said.
The Jaguar crashed into a power pole, two cement posts and a chain link fence about one minute after accelerating away from where the officer pulled the car over – about two miles away, Mayes said.
The car exploded on impact, overturned, flew through the air, and ejected the survivor from the front passenger seat through the windshield and the passenger in the left-rear back seat, who was pinned between the hood and the bumper, Mayes said.
The driver and the passenger in the right-rear back seat were trapped inside the car. All three were deceased by the time firefighters extinguished the flames, according to firefighters.
Mayes said it is too early in the investigation to determine whether the driver and right-rear passenger were wearing their seat belts, but said the two teens ejected were not.
The full investigation won’t be complete for a couple months, she said.
Jimenez, Hernandez and the survivor attended Santa Ana Opportunity School, where grief counseling is being provided for students throughout the week and into next week as needed, said Principal Mike Sanchez. Funeral Services for Jimenez will be held Friday. Services for Hernandez are pending.
Limas was a student at Pinnacles Community School. Services for Limas will be held on Saturday.
“It’s something that will probably affect our students and staff for a long, long time,” Sanchez said. “The whole community is shocked as to what’s occurred… but we don’t know the details as to what or why. We just don’t know.”
Cooper, Limas’ aunt, said although he didn’t always make the right choices, he was trying to turn things around.
She said Limas had been shuffled around from foster homes to other family member’s homes over the years, and was living with his uncle at the time of his death.
“The odds were against him – as much as the family tried to help – he tried to beat the odds and didn’t win,” she said. “He was a kid and he was adventurous and spontaneous and he liked to have fun. We have nothing but good memories of him.”
Jimenez’s family was unavailable for comment, but Santa Ana student Mercedes Cermeno said she was a popular student and a loving friend.
“I found out today and I couldn’t believe it,” Cermeno said. “We had an assembly at school and we were talking to each other and crying and helping each other.”
Hernandez’s family was also unavailable for comment.
The tragic end of young lives moved Cermeno’s mother, Julie, to tears as she stood with her arm around her daughter at a memorial at the accident site Wednesday.
“They made the wrong choice,” she said. “Everybody makes the wrong choice now and then, but they took their own lives away. They left a lot of people and friends hurt.”
Ken Rose, owner of LTD SUV Limousine where Hernandez’s parents are employed, decided to open the Albert Andrew Hernandez Memorial Fund to help his parents with some of the expense his death will incur, he said.
“It’s the least I can do,” Rose said. “It just hit me – if a parent passes away or someone is ill it’s different. This has to be the worst thing of their life.”
Donations can be sent to San Benito Bank and South Valley National Bank.
Erin Musgrave covers public safety for the Free Lance. Reach her at 637-5566, ext. 336 or
em*******@fr***********.com
