3 Youngsters Hit by Auto Still in Serious Condition

Three young boys struck by a car while crossing a busy street with their schoolteacher remained hospitalized in serious condition Friday.

Ravi Patel, 6, a first-grader at Fairmont Private School, was in critical condition in a coma Friday afternoon at UCI Medical Center in Orange, according to his father, Ramesh Patel, 39, of Yorba Linda.

Shaun Newcomb, 7, was reported in fair but stable condition at Western Medical Center-Santa Ana. He suffered a skull fracture and cuts on the back but was conscious and improved Friday morning, Evelyn Newcomb, his grandmother, said.

“He seems to be OK,” Newcomb said. “ . . . He’s such a strong, gutsy little guy.”

At the request of his parents, a UCI Medical Center spokeswoman declined to release any information about the condition of the third child, Jackson Ong, 5, who was in the hospital’s pediatric intensive care unit.

The three children were among a group of Fairmont students returning from an outing in the park across from their school as dusk was falling at 5:20 p.m. Thursday. They were crossing Valley View Avenue single file in a section of the street not marked by a crosswalk, with their teacher at the head of the line. The last three boys in line were hit by a car.

The driver, who told police that she did not see the children, was questioned and released Thursday. Brea police said Friday that they did not expect to file a complaint.

Evelyn Newcomb said that her son, Ted Newcomb, was on his way to pick up his son from the school and witnessed the accident.

“He waved to Shaun, and Shaun said, ‘Hi Dad,’ and he said, ‘Hi son,’ and the next thing he saw was three bodies jump into the air,” Newcomb related. She added that her son was “completely traumatized.”

Fairmont School director Lynn Thatcher said Thursday that pupils cross daily with their teachers into the park. She said the school did not routinely employ crosswalk guards.

“They crossed there all day long,” said Yorba Linda Mayor William E. (Gene) Wisner, who lives and works near the school. “Most people that drive Valley View should have seen kids crossing there at one time or another. . . .

“They are usually very careful, very cautious,” Wisner said. “But the time of day, I think, has a lot to do with it.”

There is a crosswalk with a traffic signal at the intersection of Valley View Avenue and Yorba Linda Boulevard, about 100 yards north of the scene of the accident, and another crosswalk without a signal to the south, Yorba Linda Assistant City Manager Bruce Channing said. Wisner and Channing were reluctant to discuss traffic safety at the intersection, citing concern that the city might be named in litigation over the accident.

However, they said it would be unusual--and unsafe--to install a crosswalk in the middle of a city block. Channing said the city has an excellent record of pedestrian safety, and he and other officials could recall no recent accidents involving pedestrians.

Wisner said that Valley View is straight, flat and perfectly level, and that the city had recently conducted a routine survey of traffic speeds in that neighborhood.

Channing said the city provides and trains crossing guards to work at its public schools. He did not know whether the city had advised private schools to do likewise.

“We’ll have to check on whether any conversations to that effect have taken place between the traffic department or the police department and the private school,” he said.

Ramesh Patel, waiting outside the intensive care unit for word about his son, said he was aware that the children routinely crossed the street with a teacher to play in the park, but he did not express his concern to school officials.

“Right now, I don’t know what I am,” Patel said. “I am not angry at the school, actually. I am not thinking of the mechanics of the accident. All I’m thinking is that my son recover.”