Neighbors Grieve After Car Kills Woman, Mother : Fatalities: A stroll to the store that ended in death for the two left residents of a quiet Anaheim neighborhood stunned.

Twice each day, Janet Schreiner, 59, and her 81-year-old mother, Mary Sach, took walks near Schreiner’s house on Monument Street in Anaheim. Saturday morning they walked to a neighborhood hardware store to buy a washer kit for a leaky bathroom faucet.

They never made it back.

At about noon, while the two women were returning, Denise Arlene Perreira, 22, drove her 1985 Chevrolette Monte Carlo up on the sidewalk once, dodged a telephone pole, and then drove up on the sidewalk again, this time fatally striking Schreiner and her mother, police said.

A small tomato plant, apparently carried by one of the two victims, lay on the ground nearby; a hardware store receipt was found in Schreiner’s pocketbook.

Perreira, who listed an Anaheim motel as her address, was hospitalized briefly for minor injuries Saturday and was then booked into Orange County Jail on suspicion of vehicular manslaughter, driving under the influence and possession of a controlled substance. Bail was set at $25,000.

On Sunday, residents of the quiet, 30-year-old neighborhood where Schreiner lived were grieving.

In soft, halting voices, neighbors described Schreiner as a devout Catholic who taught religious classes for St. Justin Martyr parish, an active member of the Brown Baggers, a group that distributes food to the needy, and a doting grandparent who was helping her divorced son Michael raise his 3-year-old boy in her home.

A registered nurse, Schreiner retired last November from the staff of the Long Beach Veterans Hospital, friends and neighbors said, and she was planning to travel.

“It was a shock to me,” said a friend, Jim Renck. “She had just retired and was looking forward to her time off. Being a nurse, a lot of people looked to her for advice, and she was always willing to help.”

May Miller, another neighbor, said Schreiner had often visited Miller’s husband as he lay dying in the Long Beach Veterans Hospital five years ago, even though she was not his nurse and worked on a different floor.

“She was very friendly and caring,” Miller said. “She worked nights, and I’d often see her as she came home each morning, after her shift ended.”

Schreiner had visited her mother in her hometown of Appleton, Wis., last Christmas, friends said, and then brought her mother back to California to escape the Midwest winter.

Mary Sach was vigorous and “sharp as a tack,” neighbors said. The two women planned to spend Easter in Atlanta, Ga., with one of Schreiner’s brothers.

Schreiner’s stepson Terry said Sunday that he and Schreiner’s son, Michael, were “shook up” and had gone to the Police Department to find out more about Perreira, only to be turned away.

“All we know is that she is still under investigation,” he said.

Police declined Sunday to release any details about Perreira’s previous driving record or the controlled substance found at the wreck.

They said Perreira’s car, eastbound on the 2500 block of Broadway, veered across the westbound lanes and eventually came to rest against a tree.

The address Perreira gave to authorities is an Anaheim motel. The assistant manager said Sunday that she had last seen Perreira three days ago and that Perreira had been living with a man there since Feb. 8.

But the man in the motel room registered to Perreira said Sunday: “I’ve only known her as an acquaintance. She’s visited here a few times, and I see her around. We’ve talked, but I hardly know her at all.”