Pregnant Riverside Victim Is Eulogized

Estela E. Perez was buried Monday at Olivewood Memorial Park in Riverside in a poignant ceremony during which two white doves were freed into the sky -- one for her and one for her unborn girl.

Perez, 29, was slain at her downtown home on Fairmount Boulevard on March 31, after dropping off her two children at school. She was at least five months pregnant. The killer remains at large.

She was eulogized at an hourlong service that included the rosary at Acheson & Graham Garden of Prayer Mortuary in Riverside, where a priest talked about her joining “God’s family,” an attendee said. Mourners were handed cards with a religious story, called “Footprints in the Sand,” written in Spanish.

Riverside police are investigating the slaying and searching for a man whom Perez’s sister and a neighbor said they saw leaving her driveway. Forensic scientists from the state Department of Justice combed the house Friday for blood and fingerprints, officials said.

Perez, an El Salvador native, was involved in the PTA at Bryant Elementary School -- where her boy and girl are in the third and fifth grade, respectively -- and its English Learners advisory committee. She helped with the student store, pizza nights, picture days and translation for Spanish-speaking parents meeting with the principal, Laurene Bryden.

“She was always talking to me about when the kids go to college,” Bryden said in an interview last weekend. She attended the funeral with several Bryant staffers.

“It’s truly like a member of the family dying,” she said.

Perez helped plan the school’s Multicultural Day, featuring dancers and singers, which was postponed after she was killed. School officials intend to reschedule the event as a memorial. They also opened a fund for the family at Citibank, whose branches will take donations.

At the half-hour burial, mourners huddled around Perez’s white casket, which was topped with white and pink roses. A camphor tree and canopy shaded 60 to 80 people and a priest who led them in prayers in Spanish.

The priest sprinkled water on the casket as a train rumbled by. Perez’s husband, Miguel, sat in a folding chair, his head bowed.

At 12:10 p.m., a woman released the first two doves, one of them for the unborn baby, Michelle. Twenty-eight more white doves trailed the pair.

Friends, family and Bryant students and staff wiped away tears during the ceremony.

Besides her immediate family, Perez is survived by her parents, two sisters and a brother, and their spouses and children, according to an obituary in the local paper.

The Perez family lives in the close-knit Fairmount Park neighborhood, where residents are still on edge from the slaying.

On Monday morning, the steps at their home were adorned with yellow potted flowers, a picture of Jesus and three candles.

Times staff writer Veronica Torrejon contributed to this report.