Boy Dies, Mother Hurt in School Intersection

At an intersection in front of a Lynwood school where neighbors have long been requesting a crossing guard or stop sign, a 3-year-old boy was killed Wednesday morning and his mother was injured when they were hit by a sport utility vehicle.

Gilberto Diaz Jr. fell under the vehicle and it rolled over his head, said Lt. Mario Barron of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Gilberto’s mother, Esperanza Diaz, suffered scrapes and bruises on her arms and legs and is being treated at St. Francis Medical Center.

The driver, a 34-year-old Lynwood woman, was not injured. Police did not identify the driver and said she would not be charged. “There was no violation of law here,” said Barron.

The vehicle had been proceeding slowly at the T-intersection at Longvale and Cedar avenues, near the front entrance of Lindbergh Elementary School, where Gilberto and his mother had been accompanying his sister, Jessica, to kindergarten. Streets were filled with children and parents at the time, and parked cars and the curved street blocked the driver’s view, according to police. The driver had been creeping her car forward to see better, Barron said.

Outraged neighbors and school employees said the accident might have been avoided with stop signs or a crossing guard, or if the crosswalks were more clearly marked.

For years, neighbors said, they have told City Hall that the streets near the school are dangerous, but nothing was done. The last time they complained was the morning before Gilberto died, when some parents met with the city’s mayor, Ricardo Sanchez.

“Why did something like this have to happen before the city wakes up and makes its schools safe for kids?” said Leonora Robles, treasurer of the school’s parent-teacher association, wiping tears from her eyes. “We’re a very low-income district. How do you hold city officials responsible?”

The mayor said in a phone interview that he was saddened by the accident and that he would work to make the intersections at schools safer. The night before the death, the council had agreed to do traffic studies at city schools, he said, adding that it will take some time.

In the meantime, resident Anna Smith led a group of parents and children in making a cardboard stop sign Wednesday afternoon. They taped it to the telephone pole a few feet away from were Gilberto died.

“The city won’t take care of it, so the community will,” Smith said.