Mother Run Over, Killed While Mourning Murdered Relative
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP/KDKA) - An Orange County woman has been killed while attending a vigil for a man shot to death a day earlier.
27-year-old Trisha Verdugo of Orange was hit by a car in a strip-mall parking lot Thursday night.
She and other mourners had gathered at a makeshift shrine outside a vacant Santa Ana store to remember 23-year-old Joseph Garcia. He was found shot to death Wednesday night in the alley behind the store.
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Police Cpl. Anthony Bertagna says Verdugo got into an argument with a motorist who hit her with his car, then struck her a second time and drove away. Verdugo's family said the driver intentionally ran over her and then rolled back over her.
Police are looking for a dark sedan but have no other details.
CBS Los Angeles reports the young mother was to start a new job at a doctor's office Monday morning.
"And it's eating me up," said aunt Norma Velasquez. "Why her. This loving girl, this loving mother. Why? Just because she came to pay respects to someone, she loses her life?"
Authorities don't know if the two deaths are gang-related.
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