Luis "Andy" Garcia
Luis "Andy" Garcia
Saturday, September 14, 2013
Age: 21
Location:
Cesar Chavez Avenue at Mission Road
Boyle Heights
Los Angeles , CA
United States
from StreetsBlogLA
Hit-and-Run in Boyle Heights Forever Changes Lives in an Instant
Jose
Vasquez leaves a candle at the ghost bike memorial for Andy Garcia,
killed last week in a vicious hit-and-run. Sahra Sulaiman/LA Streetsblog
She must have been traveling really fast, they speculated.
People tend to fly along the bridge at Cesar Chavez as it is — it can be an uneasy ride for a cyclist, day or night.
But she must have really been flooring it.
“We didn’t even have a chance to call ‘car back,’” said Jose Vasquez
to a friend as they sat in front of the ghost bike memorial set up for Luis “Andy” Garcia.
“When don’t we call ‘car back’?”
He and five friends had been riding home
in the wee hours of Sept. 14th. Experienced night riders, versed in the
rules of the road, and outfitted with helmets, lights, and reflectors,
they assumed they were safe.
Drunks hadn’t figured into their calculations.
So, when 21 year-old Wendy Villegas came tearing up Cesar Chavez over
the river, she was able to wreak utter devastation in a matter of
seconds.
She first slammed into Garcia and knocked his friend Mario Lopez to the side, barely missing Richie Berumen.
Garcia’s bike spit sparks from underneath her car as she dragged it
up the bridge. She then slammed into Ule Melgar, crumpling his back
wheel and sending him somersaulting so high, he almost went over the
bridge railing and down to the river below.
The ghost bike set up by Danny Gamboa, Kat Jarvis, and Garcia's friends. Sahra Sulaiman/LA Streetsblog
A shocked Berumen ran to help Garcia when he heard Lopez calling from the side of the road, “My back! My back!”
As he attended to Lopez, he realized a van was headed directly at
Garcia, who still lay motionless in the middle of the dark road. Berumen
screamed at the van to stop and waved his cellphone to try to get their
attention, but it was too late.
The van hit Garcia, much to the horror of the three men inside who
had just come from a church event. They immediately stopped and, unable
to do much else for him at that point, knelt down next to Garcia’s body
with their Bibles to pray.
Somehow, despite all this commotion, Villegas managed to continue weaving along on her merry way.
Another driver who saw the whole thing happen, followed her long enough to get her license plate.
“She was still intoxicated at 7 a.m.” when she was taken into custody, said Garcia’s cousin, Jose Contreras.
Even so, the detective that gave Contreras the police report said
that, because of her age and her clean record, they would be lucky if
she got 5 years’ time.
He couldn’t believe it.
Neither could Garcia’s friends.
“If you tried to run over a police officer,” said Melgar, still sore from the incident and sporting significant road rash on his back, “they’d consider [a car] a weapon.”
“How can you just take off? And leave someone in the road?” asked another friend, shaking his head.
Garcia's family joins his friends at the memorial on the bridge along Cesar Chavez. Sahra Sulaiman/LA Streetsblog
More than one: Lopez is still recovering from a broken back.
If she had just stopped, Melgar lamented, she might have been able to
prevent him from being hit again. Or maybe he might have survived.
At least the three Christian men would not have to live with the guilt that they had hit somebody.
“She’s ruined a lot of lives,” I said, glancing over at his family sitting next to the memorial.
They had come in from El Paso the night before to take Garcia back home.
Garcia had only arrived in L.A. a little over a year ago and had loved it out here.
He hadn’t been a biker before — in fact, he had come out here to
finish college and wrestle. He was an all-star athlete and a talented
artist. But biking had given him a circle of great friends and a love
for the city.
Once he got a taste of life out here, his father said with tears in his eyes, “there was no turning back for him.”
Until Villegas decided to drink and drive.
A facebook page was set up for Andy and the ghost bike installed in his memory.
A fundraiser and memorial ride preceeded the installation of his ghosbike, with hundreds of riders in attendance.
Saturday, September 14, 2013
Age: 21
Location:
Cesar Chavez Avenue at Mission Road
Boyle Heights
Los Angeles , CA
United States
from StreetsBlogLA
Hit-and-Run in Boyle Heights Forever Changes Lives in an Instant
Jose
Vasquez leaves a candle at the ghost bike memorial for Andy Garcia,
killed last week in a vicious hit-and-run. Sahra Sulaiman/LA Streetsblog
She must have been traveling really fast, they speculated.
People tend to fly along the bridge at Cesar Chavez as it is — it can be an uneasy ride for a cyclist, day or night.
But she must have really been flooring it.
“We didn’t even have a chance to call ‘car back,’” said Jose Vasquez
to a friend as they sat in front of the ghost bike memorial set up for Luis “Andy” Garcia.
“When don’t we call ‘car back’?”
He and five friends had been riding home
in the wee hours of Sept. 14th. Experienced night riders, versed in the
rules of the road, and outfitted with helmets, lights, and reflectors,
they assumed they were safe.
Drunks hadn’t figured into their calculations.
So, when 21 year-old Wendy Villegas came tearing up Cesar Chavez over
the river, she was able to wreak utter devastation in a matter of
seconds.
She first slammed into Garcia and knocked his friend Mario Lopez to the side, barely missing Richie Berumen.
Garcia’s bike spit sparks from underneath her car as she dragged it
up the bridge. She then slammed into Ule Melgar, crumpling his back
wheel and sending him somersaulting so high, he almost went over the
bridge railing and down to the river below.
The ghost bike set up by Danny Gamboa, Kat Jarvis, and Garcia's friends. Sahra Sulaiman/LA Streetsblog
A shocked Berumen ran to help Garcia when he heard Lopez calling from the side of the road, “My back! My back!”
As he attended to Lopez, he realized a van was headed directly at
Garcia, who still lay motionless in the middle of the dark road. Berumen
screamed at the van to stop and waved his cellphone to try to get their
attention, but it was too late.
The van hit Garcia, much to the horror of the three men inside who
had just come from a church event. They immediately stopped and, unable
to do much else for him at that point, knelt down next to Garcia’s body
with their Bibles to pray.
Somehow, despite all this commotion, Villegas managed to continue weaving along on her merry way.
Another driver who saw the whole thing happen, followed her long enough to get her license plate.
“She was still intoxicated at 7 a.m.” when she was taken into custody, said Garcia’s cousin, Jose Contreras.
Even so, the detective that gave Contreras the police report said
that, because of her age and her clean record, they would be lucky if
she got 5 years’ time.
He couldn’t believe it.
Neither could Garcia’s friends.
“If you tried to run over a police officer,” said Melgar, still sore from the incident and sporting significant road rash on his back, “they’d consider [a car] a weapon.”
“How can you just take off? And leave someone in the road?” asked another friend, shaking his head.
Garcia's family joins his friends at the memorial on the bridge along Cesar Chavez. Sahra Sulaiman/LA Streetsblog
More than one: Lopez is still recovering from a broken back.
If she had just stopped, Melgar lamented, she might have been able to
prevent him from being hit again. Or maybe he might have survived.
At least the three Christian men would not have to live with the guilt that they had hit somebody.
“She’s ruined a lot of lives,” I said, glancing over at his family sitting next to the memorial.
They had come in from El Paso the night before to take Garcia back home.
Garcia had only arrived in L.A. a little over a year ago and had loved it out here.
He hadn’t been a biker before — in fact, he had come out here to
finish college and wrestle. He was an all-star athlete and a talented
artist. But biking had given him a circle of great friends and a love
for the city.
Once he got a taste of life out here, his father said with tears in his eyes, “there was no turning back for him.”
Until Villegas decided to drink and drive.
A facebook page was set up for Andy and the ghost bike installed in his memory.
A fundraiser and memorial ride preceeded the installation of his ghosbike, with hundreds of riders in attendance.