Three Children Dead, Fourth Hospitalized, After Hit-and-Run Pedestrian Crash

Three young girls were killed on Saturday night, and a fourth was hospitalized, after a driver struck them in the Lucerne Valley, then fled the scene, the California Highway Patrol said in a Tuesday news release.

Sandra Mizer, 13, Willow Sanchez, 11, and Daytona Bronas, 12, were tragically killed when a driver hit them as they walked along the northbound lane of Camp Rock Road. They were pronounced dead at the scene.

“My baby’s gone,” Sandra’s grandmother Tammy Midkiff said. “I can’t have her no more.”

Natalie Coe, 14, survived, but has been hospitalized at Loma Linda University Medical Center with what her mother says are life-threatening injuries.

“Her leg was amputated in the accident, all her other limbs are shattered and her liver is bleeding, her kidneys are struggling,” Natalie’s mother Sherrie Orndorff said.

“[Natalie]’s been my whole world,” she said, voice breaking.

Two of the girls, Natalie and Daytona, used wheelchairs due to their disabilities.

According to the CHP, an unknown driver and passenger in a white 2002 Chevrolet Silverado appeared to have drifted into the shoulder while the girls were walking.

Orndoff, also Willow’s older sister, said the four had been spending the night at her house and decided to go for a stroll around 10 p.m.

“My sister was a beautiful bright girl who overcame so much already,” she said. “I don’t know what to do without my baby sister.”

Witnesses told family members that the driver and passenger used a flashlight to see who they had struck after the collision, before fleeing the scene on foot. Neither suspect called 911.

“You’re a coward. You killed three kids, you took their lives,” said Christine Cordova, aunt to one of the victims, “You didn’t just take them, you hurt everybody.”

“And you get to go home with your family, and ours will never come back,” Cordova said.

The CHP asks that anyone with information for the ongoing investigation into the collision contact Officer L. McAllister, at the Victorville CHP Area office at (760) 241-1186.

Source: NBC Los Angeles