Pittsburg, California woman accidentally runs over 5-year-old daughter

celeb_2006 · May 9th, 2008, 01:03 AM

Pittsburg woman accidentally runs over 5-year-old daughter

(sad beyond words)

A 5-year-old girl riding a tricycle near her Pittsburg home was accidentally run over and killed by her mother, police said today.
Rachel Lopez was run over by her mother's van at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday on the 1000 block of Muir Creek Drive, police Lt. Brian Addington said. Rachel was taken to Sutter Delta Medical Center in Antioch, where she was pronounced dead.
Rachel's mother was returning home in her 1993 Volkswagen van when she saw two of her three daughters playing on the sidewalk about two houses away from their home, Addington said.
She told them to go inside and began driving at a slow speed, not realizing that her third daughter, Rachel, was also outside and had pedaled her tricycle in front of the car, police said.
The mother, who was not identified, realized she had run over something, got out and saw her daughter pinned under the right front tire, police said.
She jumped back into the car and backed up and tended to her daughter while awaiting paramedics, authorities said.
The woman is not facing charges, Addington said. "It doesn't look like there's any negligence or criminal intent on her part," he said.

sparkly · May 9th, 2008, 01:18 AM

OMG, that's horrible. That woman is going to feel guilty for the rest of her life.

McJag · May 9th, 2008, 03:58 AM

Sad,sad,sad.

DontMindMe · May 9th, 2008, 04:00 AM

Oh God that's awful! So sad.

Just Kill Me · May 9th, 2008, 11:09 AM

Why did a five year old not know that she isn't supposed to play in the street in front of cars?

Sweetie · May 9th, 2008, 11:17 AM

^ Better yet, why is a 5 year old left home without proper supervision.

Just Kill Me · May 9th, 2008, 11:42 AM

Who was watching them?

Sweetie · May 9th, 2008, 11:45 AM

I have no idea, sounds like no one was.

crumpet · May 9th, 2008, 12:45 PM

You know, I really can't get on board with the idea that no person under age 16 is ever, ever supposed to be out of direct eye contact from a supervising adult at all times. Accidents happen and nobody meant for this to happen. No parent is perfect and everyone is probably just lucky that nothing awful ever happened during one of their 'looked away for a second' moments.

MrsDark · May 9th, 2008, 01:02 PM

I agree with you crumpet, but if that happened to me I'd probably want to go home and shoot myself in the head.

colormyworld · May 9th, 2008, 02:30 PM

It's awful, and I feel so bad for the mom. A little girl I used to babysit...a beautiful beautiful little girl almost 16 months old, died because of a horrible mistake by her mother. She answered the phone while the girl was in the bathtub. Gone a little over a minute, and when she came back, the girl had stood up, slipped in the tub, and drowned. There's a lot of coulda woulda shoulda in this type of situation, but just the guilt that the mother must feel is
more punishment than many could even handle. That family moved out of their house the next day because of the pain associated with it. My heart goes out to this girl's whole family.

Sweetie · May 9th, 2008, 02:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by crumpet

You know, I really can't get on board with the idea that no person under age 16 is ever, ever supposed to be out of direct eye contact from a supervising adult at all times. Accidents happen and nobody meant for this to happen. No parent is perfect and everyone is probably just lucky that nothing awful ever happened during one of their 'looked away for a second' moments.

Oh, I agree with you on that, but this situation is clearly something that will weigh on the mother's mind for a long time, as it should.....a 5 year old has no business being left alone when theie is a chance it could get on the road, that is lack of parenting to me.

january · May 9th, 2008, 07:24 PM

When I was a kid me and my brother used to play in the yard all the time, and go ride bikes. My mom would check on us once or twice from the kitchen window while she did stuff around the house. My brother looked after me for the most part, since he was four years older. But man I would have hated if something happened to me and someone blamed my mom, she was a good parent. Its only been recently that people think that children should be kept under lock and key. My mom let us out and about the neighborhood, run off and visit kids who lived a few blocks down, go play in the yard, etc. After all, whoever was watching them probably thought since they were in a group, they'd keep an eye on each other; the girl may have been the youngest and the other girls were supposed to be watching out for her.