Mourning the Death of a Mother

Drawn together by tragedy, family and friends gathered Sunday at the home of Angel Aviles, whose wife died Sunday from injuries suffered when she was struck Friday by a car as she crossed a street on her way home from the market.

Bertha Garcia, 26, died about 12:30 a.m. of severe head injuries, Aviles said. Miraculously, her 11-month-old daughter, Ashley, was only slightly injured. Garcia was carrying Ashley when she was struck while crossing Fairview Road at Baker Street.

The impact threw mother and child 25 feet, a witness said.

Aviles said of the child, “My wife cradled her, she protected her.” He demonstrated the protective posture that he thinks saved his daughter’s life. “I believe that is why [my wife] was hit in the head.”

Garcia and her sister, Susan Meneses, had gone to the supermarket about 9:30 p.m., taking with them Ashley and her 4-year-old sister, Vanessa.

They had started crossing with the light, Meneses said, but as they neared the opposite curb of the six-lane street she saw the car coming south on Fairview.

“I screamed to her and pulled Vanessa out of the way,” Meneses said, speaking quietly in her dead sister’s apartment. “Then she was hit. I saw everything. It was terrible to me. I don’t believe it.”

Costa Mesa police are investigating the accident.

Sgt. Richard Bell said there is “no indication of fault.” The driver was interviewed Friday night, and police said they do not think alcohol or drugs were involved. “It was just a regular, everyday accident, and somebody died,” he said.

A summary of the police report says that the four were crossing Fairview at Baker when they “angled over to the curb” just outside the crosswalk.

Witnesses said the scene was littered with groceries. People gathered to aid Garcia.

At the intersection Sunday, a few passersby stopped to look at the green tracings of the accident made Saturday by investigators. It indicates that Garcia was struck within 3 feet of the curb, about 5 yards south of the crosswalk.

Aviles, who is a roofer, said he was at home having dinner when a relative told him what had just happened. He ran to the corner, which is a few hundred yards from his home.

Aviles donated his wife’s organs and is talking with family members in Mexico about coming here to help him with the children.

Ashley was asleep in a bedroom Sunday afternoon as half a dozen adults shared their grief with Aviles in the living-dining area of the apartment on Fairview. Amid the somber faces of the adults, Vanessa laughed occasionally while playing with several friends.

“She knows what happened,” Aviles said. “She knows her mother is in the hospital. I need to prepare her now to tell her, ‘Mother is dead.’ ”