Victims, Survivors Relive Horrors

Pouran Ahdoot weeps each night for her dead mother and baby nephew. Margaret Bard celebrates the miraculous but slow recovery of her brain-injured husband. Jenna Edwards still flashes on the horrid images of bodies scattered amid oranges and broccoli.

As they absorbed news that driver error was to blame for the July 16 Santa Monica Farmers’ Market tragedy, several of the 63 injured victims and survivors of the 10 who died were forced Thursday to revisit the horrors of that day.

And although the victims and survivors are united by lingering grief and pain, they are somewhat divided over what should happen to George Russell Weller, the driver, who will turn 87 on Jan. 1.

Several said they think Weller should be charged with a crime, with some suggesting that he should spend the rest of his life in prison. Others expressed compassion for him and wondered what good could come of his incarceration.

But most agreed on one thing: The calamity should lead to laws requiring that elderly drivers be road-tested often and their licenses revoked at the first hint of infirmity.

“We have to have stringent laws and make sure that people who are on medication don’t drive,” said Dan Khani, whose octogenarian mother remains in a Santa Monica convalescent home recuperating from a broken neck and other injuries.

A preliminary report by the California Highway Patrol, details of which were reported Thursday in The Times, eliminated all causes other than human error for the summer tragedy in the seaside city.

Whether to charge Weller with a crime rests with Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley, whose office said a decision is still weeks away.

In its preliminary findings, the CHP concluded that Weller might have been impaired by prescription medication that causes nausea and dizziness, or by hip replacements that reduced his mobility. A special CHP investigative team found that Weller first hit a car half a block from the market, then accelerated and entered a stretch of Arizona Avenue that is reserved on Wednesdays for pedestrians and vendors.

Driving with “eyes open [and] hands on the steering wheel at the 10 o’clock and 2 o’clock position,” the report said, he reached speeds of 60 mph or more as he plowed through the bustling bazaar’s 2 1/2 blocks.

Margaret Bard, whose husband and screenwriting partner, Bartley Bard, suffered a serious brain injury, said the facts as laid out by the CHP suggest that Weller “absolutely should be charged with a crime.”

“By leaving the scene of one accident,” she said, “he caused a greater accident.”

Edwards, 26, said she believes police have treated Weller differently because of his age. “I think they don’t want to charge him because he’s so old,” she said. “If it was me at 26, I’d be in jail. He should be treated like anyone else.”

Edwards, an actress who lives in Burbank, recalled that she had just bought oranges in the market’s closing minutes when what looked like a tidal wave came rushing toward her.

A car appeared from beneath the umbrellas and hit stall after stall, person after person, Edwards said. A table pinned her to the ground, injuring her back, a shoulder and a knee.

“In my heart of all hearts, I know it wasn’t an accident,” she said. “I’ve always thought he did it on purpose.”

Weller swerved from side to side, Edwards said, and “hit everything he could,” without making any attempt to brake or steer his 1992 Buick LeSabre into a building. “If your car is going and you are out of control, you swerve into something to stop you,” she said. He should never have been on the road, she added.

Ilona Lettrich, 60, said she considers herself the victim of a crime. “I was just innocently buying organic vegetables,” she said. “Then I ended up in a situation where my whole life was changed from that moment on. He caused that.”

Lettrich was standing next to a fruit stand near 2nd Street when she heard a loud noise and someone yell, “Watch out!” The car struck her, injuring ankles, arms and ribs. Two fingers were severed, but doctors were able to reattach them.

Because of her injuries, Lettrich had to close the hair salon she had run for 16 years. She also can no longer teach yoga.

Although she did not think Weller consciously entered the market or intended to kill anyone, “When he was in it, he definitely wanted to finish it,” she said.

Lettrich said she doesn’t necessarily want Weller to go to jail. But she would like to stand up with other victims and their family members and tell him how they feel. And, she said, “I want to hear him apologize.”

No apology could ease the anguish of Pouran Ahdoot, a daughter of Molok Ghoulian, 62, who died in the tragedy along with Ghoulian’s 7-month-old grandson, Brandon Esfahani Davidi. Brandon was Ahdoot’s nephew.

“I cry every night,” said Ahdoot, reached at her home in Rockville, Md. “My dad is alone; my sister is upset. We are still in shock.”

Weller, she said, should be charged with a crime. Still, she aches for him too.

“In a way, I feel bad for him,” she said. “In another way, he shouldn’t drive.... I’m hoping that they pass a law that from a certain age [drivers] have to be tested every few months.”

Bertha Lattier, 71, in Shreveport, La., said she felt her eldest son’s absence on Thanksgiving. She cooked up a storm to keep her mind off Leroy Lattier, the first person to be hit along Arizona Avenue.

She spends little time thinking about the driver or how he should be punished.

“I don’t have hate in my heart for anybody,” she said. “That man is too old to be sitting up in jail. He has to live with himself. When you’ve got to live with your conscience, that’s a terrible thing.”

Laura Avery, who manages the farmers market, said she agreed with the CHP’s conclusion that driver error caused the tragedy that July day.

“Nobody is ever going to know what went on that day in his mind,” she said, adding that she didn’t think sending Weller to jail was the answer.

“What is that going to accomplish?” she asked. In the months since the tragedy, Avery said, the close community of vendors and shoppers has tried to move forward, but they are constantly reminded of favorite customers who are gone.

“The tragedy is still fresh in people’s minds,” she said. “I don’t think we’ll ever forget it.”