Fatal Van Crash Haunts Survivors

It had been about eight weeks since the accident when Mirtala Castro looked at the clock on her wall and saw that it was time to try to climb her personal Mt. Everest again.

Although her doctors prescribed exercise, the 50-year-old grandmother still needed the steady hand of her husband, Rojelino, 56, and a metal walker just to hobble 10 steps.

“The doctor says I should be walking around our house. But I get tired very easily,” she said, pausing to catch her breath.

Mirtala Castro’s life took a dramatic turn the night of Sept. 20. That night, she and her daughter Sonia, 30, were among the 18 parishioners who had crowded into a church van that was hit broadside by a pickup at Civic Center Drive and Flower Street in Santa Ana.

Eight people died and 11 more were injured in the crash, which has been described as Orange County’s worst ever. Mirtala Castro suffered major injuries to her back and head. Her daughter Sonia died.

When CHP Officer Ron Brame arrived at the scene, he had no idea that the accident would prove to be the deadliest in Orange County history.

The intersection was wide. All traffic lights were working. A van attempting to make a left turn from Flower Street onto Civic Center Drive had been hit broadside by a pickup, which in turn was hit by a BMW. The pavement was dry. The accident had occurred about 6 p.m., but there was ample light left for drivers to see without their headlights.

To Brame, who had seen hundreds of traffic accidents, the damage to each of the three vehicles involved “did not seem that much,” he recalled. Only later did he and Santa Ana police investigators realize that the rear doors of the van flew open during the collision, hurling many of its passengers out of the vehicle as it spun around.

And then, as accident investigators probed further, it appeared that the van’s owner-driver, the Rev. Octavio Valentin, a 55-year-old pastor of a tiny, 80-member non-sectarian Iglesia de Dios (Church of God), had failed to bolt to the floorboard some rear seat benches he had installed. And there were no safety belts for the added seats, either.

In the immediate wake of the accident, Valentin maintained that the seats had been bolted to the floor, but may have come loose in the crash. But more recently he has declined further comment on the modifications made to accommodate more passengers.

Also, the alleged driver of the pickup, Fernando Hernandez Flores, 23, of Riverside, who fled the crash scene on foot, remains a fugitive with an arrest warrant for felony hit and run. He may have fled to Mexico, police said.

“Criminal charges (against more than one of the motorists) are a possibility,” Santa Ana Police Lt. Robert Helton said. He said police investigators are awaiting the CHP’s report, which is expected as soon as next week.

No citations have been filed against Valentin. However, state Department of Motor Vehicles records show that Valentin has been in three accidents in the past 3 1/2 years, was cited in December, 1989, for failing to stop at a red light and does not have the required special license to drive more than 10 people in a van.

Whether Valentin or the van driver is criminally culpable for the deaths will not be known until after the CHP’s accident report is handed over to Santa Ana police and analyzed, Helton said. Although police conducted an investigation of the crash site, Helton said inspection of the van was the primary focus of a special CHP’s accident team.

Once both reports are analyzed, recommendations will be made by police for the filing of criminal charges, if any are necessary, Helton said.

“If it’s determined that there’s criminal culpability against any of the drivers, we will provide those recommendations to the district attorney’s office, which will make the determination for filing charges,” Helton said.

The dual investigation represents one of the most extensive in recent history, Helton said. He added that because of the interest expressed by the public and some city officials, police officials are planning to hold a news conference when their findings are completed.

Helton said the overall investigation, which included gathering reports, searching for the driver of the pickup and interviewing witnesses, “has all been done” by police.

The CHP “bring a cadre of very technically trained and educated people from a lot of different disciplines to tell us how that accident took place. They have that ability,” Helton said.

Santa Ana City Manager David N. Ream said some residents did attend a City Council meeting and expressed a need for greater public safety information in reaction to the crash. But no council action was taken.

Councilman Miguel A. Pulido Jr. said that at the mayor’s request, the city flew its U.S. flags at half-mast for one week after the accident.

“It was to show our sorrow of what occurred,” Pulido said.

The Rev. David R. Pasamonte of the First United Methodist Church in Santa Ana, where Valentin leased chapel space, said parishioners there and the public have donated almost $58,000 to help the crash victims.

“It already has helped a family pay for funeral costs, a bill from the city, and it was used to help pay the rent for three of the families,” Pasamonte said.

The public’s generosity didn’t end there. Students and faculty at Santiago High School in Garden Grove raised more than $500. The money was donated to the family of Ericka Mendez, 17, a Santiago High junior who was in the church van and died. The donations helped cover funeral costs.

Whatever the investigation shows, it will provide little solace for the victims of the crash and their families, including Mirtala and Rojelino Castro, who missed the funeral held in Guatemala for their daughter Sonia.

During a recent interview, the Castros talked about their ordeal and the emotional turmoil, including bitter feelings Rojelino Castro said he has toward Pastor Valentin.

“We couldn’t go to her (Sonia’s) funeral because my wife was gravely ill,” said Rojelino Castro, adding that Valentin has only visited his wife once since the accident. “I think he feels guilty about all this because a lot was his responsibility.”

Sonia Castro’s aunt, Concepcion Palma of Westminster, accompanied her body back to El Progreso, the family’s hometown east of Guatemala City. In a videotape of the memorial services that Palma brought back, it shows more than 100 neighbors, family and friends, including many of Sonia Castro’s fellow elementary school teachers, at her funeral.

“She had only been in the United States four years,” Mirtala Castro said of her daughter, who was eulogized as someone who “wanted a better life for herself” and left the poverty of Guatemala to improve her chances of opportunity in Orange County.

Sonia Castro taught elementary schoolchildren in Progreso, but had found no equivalent job in the United States and worked part time baby-sitting, her mother said. Sonia also was taking English courses at a nearby Santa Ana school.

After spending 47 days in a hospital, Mirtala Castro must now wear a heavy brace to support her back. She remembers very little of the crash. She suffered four ruptured discs from wrenching her back when she was thrown from the van, and she suffers memory lapses due to a severe head gash.

She said she recalls that the van was packed with people. Every seat was taken, and some children had to sit on the floor of the van.

“I remember the crash, the loud noise and the van turning and turning. But after that, my memory is foggy,” she said.

According to police and witnesses, the rear doors burst open on impact, and as the van circled violently in the middle of the intersection, its rear occupants were thrown out. Mirtala Castro gashed her head, possibly when it struck the pavement, and suffered severe bruises on her upper left arm where she smacked into a concrete wall. Her legs and other parts of her body are scabbed where her body skipped along the street before it stopped on a sidewalk.

“At times, she just starts talking about things that happened more than a year and a half ago. But when I ask her about something that happened in the summer, she only remembers a little bit or can’t recall anything,” her husband said.