Just as She Finds Focus, Woman Loses Life

Leticia Camarillo of Oxnard had drifted through her twenties trying to figure out what she wanted to do with her life.

She was finally making some progress, said her sister, when a car wreck on Sunday cut short her life and that of her 7-year-old daughter, Veronica Falcon.

“Before, she was like any young person: full of life, but not with any real sense of direction,” said Lydia Camarillo, 41, of San Antonio.

But last year, Leticia began a transformation. She converted from Catholicism and was baptized into the Solid Rock Christian Center on Walker Street in Ventura less than a year ago.

She was coming home from Sunday services when she lost control of her car, police said.

The 28-year-old single mother had saved money to buy a house and was getting ready to close the deal.

She had recently received a promotion from the Ventura County Human Services Agency, where she worked to help people find jobs and get off welfare.

And Camarillo, a Hueneme High School graduate who had earned an associate’s degree at Oxnard College, was working toward an education degree at Cal State Northridge.

“I believe she was going to do it,” Lydia Camarillo said.

She was involved with a prayer group for sick members of her church, family members said, and planned to step into more of a leadership role there.

According to her family she was devoted to her only child.

“She had a motherly heart. Whenever there was a child, she was there to pamper it,” said Delia Camarillo, 34, Leticia’s sister who lived with her.

Family members said Veronica was a lively and caring 7-year-old who loved to sing in her church choir and did well in her second-grade class at Oxnard’s Maria West Elementary School.

“She was always very happy,” said Delia Camarillo.

As Leticia drove her daughter home from church services, she lost control of her car, crossed a dirt and gravel divider and slid sideways across the northbound lanes of Victoria Avenue, according to a police report.

Camarillo’s Honda Accord was struck by a late-model Volkswagen Bug driven by Ventura pharmacist David C. Beckerellison, 37.

Both mother and daughter were killed instantly. Senior Deputy Coronor James Baroni listed the cause of death Monday as injuries from blunt force trauma.

Beckerellison was treated for minor scrapes and bruises and released from Community Memorial Hospital in Ventura.

Police have found no evidence that drugs or alcohol were involved. All parties involved were wearing seat belts.

California Highway Patrol Officer Fred Baskin said he wasn’t sure why Camarillo lost control of her car on the curve where cars travel at at least 55 mph. An investigation is continuing, he said.

Leticia, who was born in El Paso, moved to Oxnard with her family when she was 4.

She was the youngest of eight children.

“She was the first one to leave us,” Lydia said.