Family, Friends Mourn Girl Struck in Crosswalk

As mourners entered Community Reformed Church in Buena Park on Saturday to remember 6-year-old Mary Dargan, who died after a car hit her in a crosswalk, a neighbor and family friend said the death could have been avoided.

“We need a traffic light there,” said Chet Polston, 67, about the Buena Park intersection marked by a yellow crosswalk and stop signs. “We’ve got to get that thing taken care of.”

Mary, a first-grader at San Marino Elementary School, was walking home from school holding hands with her grandmother and younger sister Tuesday when a car hit all three in the crosswalk on Crescent Avenue at San Marino Drive. Mary died of her injuries Wednesday.

Rose Dargan, 72, remains in satisfactory condition with a broken pelvis and cuts at Los Alamitos Medical Center. Morgan Dargan, 5, who is in kindergarten, is in stable condition at Charter Community Hospital in Hawaiian Gardens with a fractured thigh bone.

“The sad part about it is (Morgan) keeps asking for her sister,” Polston said. “It’s a shame, a total shame.”

The driver, 25-year-old Deborah Casey of La Palma, has been charged with misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter. If convicted, she could receive up to a year in County Jail or a fine, a spokesman for the district attorney’s office said. Casey’s mother, Jeanette, has said her daughter was hysterical after the accident and on sedatives.

But Polston said he doesn’t blame Casey for the accident. “People have been trying to get a stoplight there for 20 years,” he said. “If I was going to be a crosswalk guard, I’d be scared to work there.”

Neighbors complained Tuesday that the intersection across the street from San Marino school has been the scene of several accidents. Studies in several Orange County cities have shown that pedestrians are more likely to be hit at a marked crosswalk than at an unmarked crossing because they feel a false sense of security.

Polston said Rose Dargan walked her granddaughter home from school almost every day. They lived about half a block from the accident site.

More than 150 friends and family members attended the funeral. A portrait of Mary sat amid white carnations and pink roses on top of her small, white casket.

The Rev. Duane Tellinghuisen asked the audience to look at the picture and keep Mary in their memories.

“Isn’t that what life consists of, memories?” he said. “Aren’t those the things we really cherish?

“We can ask, ‘Why, God?’ But there’s no answer. Friends, don’t wait around for the answer.”

After the burial at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Cypress, Mary’s friends and classmates placed flowers at the scene of the accident as a memorial.