Mourners Pack Memorial Service for Jasmin Cook

A pine-paneled country church overflowed Saturday with mourners for 20-year-old Jasmin Marie Cook, whose family said they harbored no animosity for the young neighbor accused of running her down in his pickup truck.

“My daughter is dead,” Tyra Cook said following the memorial service, tears streaming down her face. “If I don’t have any anger, why should anybody else?”

Cook and her husband, Edward, said they were saddened that 25-year-old Shane Young, who could face manslaughter and drunk-driving charges in connection with the fatal accident, decided not to attend the emotional service.

“He should have been here like everybody else who came to celebrate my daughter’s life,” Tyra Cook said. “He did not come because he did not want to incite any violent reaction in people who may blame him for what happened.”

The mother said that Young--who investigators say was racing another vehicle on Silverado Canyon Road last Sunday when he struck Jasmin--lived nearby and was one of her daughter’s many friends. Jasmin Cook was walking with two others along the narrow canyon road when she was hit.

Immediately following the accident, Cook said, Young “dropped to the ground” in anguish near her daughter’s body and “now carries that pain forever.”

“There is no way you can change what happened,” said Edward Cook. “Accidents happen. God wanted my daughter, and he took her.”

Young, a chronic speeder with enough tickets to have forced the revocation of his license earlier this year, was released Friday from Orange County Jail after authorities said they needed more time to prepare criminal charges against him.

Despite his driving record, Young was allowed to remain on the road because he was included in a state research program that studied how habitually negligent drivers are punished. Friday, the state Department of Motor Vehicles announced it will cancel the research program following public outrage over Young’s special driving status.

At the memorial service Saturday, family and friends pointed to the tragic accident as a reason to unite what, residents said, is an often-troubled community.

Before his daughter’s death, Edward Cook said, Jasmin was “just getting her life back together” from serious bouts with drug use. He said other canyon kids have withdrawn into unhealthy cliques, with some caught up in such things as “devil worship.”

“We should take this opportunity to become a community of family, not a community of slanderers and strangers,” he said from the church rostrum. “We should take this opportunity to know each other. It’s unfortunate that it took my daughter’s life to bring this out. We should stick together. I’ll do it for you. You do it for me.”

The father’s words brought loud applause from the gathering.

The front and rear of the church contained photographs of the straw-haired young woman, and tables in the church vestibule were laden with mementos tracking her growth from infancy.

On another side of the church’s tiny entry was displayed an open letter from Shana Cook, written after her sister’s death.

“Jasmin was so special to me,” the letter began. “I miss her so much. I know that everybody else misses her, too. I know that God is taking good care of her and that she is so happy. I know that she was not happy here and God just had to do what he had to do to make her happy.”

In another letter written two years ago at Christmastime, Tyra Cook talked of how her daughter had become “a blessing to me over the years.”

“Thank you for the thousands of hugs and kisses you’ve given me,” the mother said. “I’ll always cherish them in my heart. Thank you for being a wonderful daughter and a great friend. I love you ‘til infinity.”

Friends talked of Jasmin’s love for music and honored her by singing one of her favorite songs during the service: “Cat’s in the Cradle.” As they sang, many in the gathering began to weep.

“Jasmin is not really dead,” her mother told the mourners. “She is alive. She has only left her shell. . . . “

Friends of the family have set up a memorial fund to assist the parents, both of whom are out of work. Contributions can be made in the name of Tyra Cook at Universal Savings Bank, 1249 E. Katella Ave., Orange 92667.