Laguna Niguel Boy Dragged to Death by Startled Horse

As relatives and strangers scrambled desperately to save him, a 9-year-old Laguna Niguel boy on a holiday outing with his family was thrown from a horse and dragged to his death near Palm Springs on Thursday afternoon.

Anthony “Tony” Martinez had been riding with his parents and older brother, Danny, at the Smoke Tree Stables in the Colorado Desert when a barking dog digging for rabbits startled the group’s horses.

Tony’s horse bolted off the trail, into the desert.

“Tony’s horse started backing up and all of a sudden it took off,” his mother, Becky, said Friday.

“Tony’s a little guy, just 55 pounds. It just threw him back very quickly. He had no time to grab the reins. Tony fell but his foot was caught in the stirrup. The horse dragged him at full run. It just seemed like forever.”

Most of the other horses in the group were also spooked by the dog, but refused to run. Tony’s family jumped off their horses and gave chase on foot.

“We were all running,” Tony’s mother said. “All I could hear was Danny screaming for his brother. I just shut down. All I could do was run. But there was no way on God’s green Earth we could ever catch up.”

Only one woman, on horseback for the first time, was able to chase after Tony’s horse.

“She was panicked,” Tony’s mother said. “But she knew the only way we would be able to find him is if she stayed with that horse.”

As the woman caught up to the runaway horse, Tony’s body worked free of the stirrup. The woman’s horse jumped over him. She jumped off, fracturing her leg, to stay with the boy. Her horse kept galloping after the other horse.

The woman, huddled over Tony’s body, began screaming, and the rest of the group ran toward them. Tony was barely breathing, and his throat was full of blood. His mother cradled him to her chest.

The group, however, was stranded in the middle of the desert without their horses. Another man with the group, a doctor, performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on the boy. The horses eventually wandered back to the Smoke Tree Stables, where employees knew something was wrong and sent out a search party.

Tony was taken to an area hospital.

“Everybody was working on him,” Becky said. “I knew there were massive head injuries, but I didn’t realize how extensively his little body had been hurt. His ribs were broken. His lungs were punctured. And his heart couldn’t stand up to the shock of it.”

Tony’s helmet had also popped off while he was being dragged, said Palm Springs Police Sgt. Bryan Anderson.

Tony had lived in Laguna Niguel for about a year, and lived in Fountain Valley and Anaheim before that, said Jeff Staudinger, his uncle.

Danny Martinez turned 11 on Friday. Tony would have turned 10 on Jan. 4.

The large family--three brothers and three sisters in all, including Becky and Staudinger, and many children, including Tony and Danny--had planned to celebrate both Christmas and Danny’s birthday Friday night. The family was still planning to huddle together.

“We want to all be together,” said Tina Staudinger, Tony’s aunt. “We just don’t know what we’re going to do about tomorrow. We don’t know what we’re going to do about Christmas.”

Jeff Staudinger said his nephew was “one of those special kids who touches everybody he comes in contact with.”

“Tony was the life of the party,” his mother said. “He’s one of those kids that just walks into a room and makes everybody laugh.”

Tony’s parents said the guide may have been able to avert the incident by grabbing the reins on Tony’s horse, which they believe were within the guide’s reach. Instead, the mother said, the trail guide got off his horse when the dog started barking.

At the Smoke Tree Stables, a worker said company owners were not available and declined to discuss the accident.