Daniel Trujillo-Jones.Photo: GoFundMe
One of thetwo children who were killed at a racing eventin Texas over the weekend has been identified.Daniel Trujillo-Jones, 6, died after a driver lost control of their car and struck multiple spectators at the Kerrville-Kerr County Airport on Saturday, a family friend told ABC stationKSAT.Chance Jones, Daniel’s father, and Katy Walls, Chance’s girlfriend, were also injured in the crash and hospitalized, according to KSAT. The boy’s two younger siblings, ages 4 and 3 months old, were released from the hospital.Although police have yet to release the names of any children involved in the crash, they previously identified Chance, 26, and Walls, 27, as among the eight people injured.In anupdateon Monday, the Kerrville Police Department said that Chance remained hospitalized in stable condition, while Walls was in critical condition.Rebecca Cedillo, 46, and Michael Gonzales, the 34-year-old driver who was behind the wheel at the time of the crash, were hospitalized for their injuries, police said.Two more people, as well as the two children — the latter of whom were identified as a 4-year-old male and a 3-month-old female — were also taken to local hospitals for “precautionary evaluations” and later released, per police.
Daniel was remembered as being “full of life,” according to family friend Kary Sabedra.Sabedra, who owns the company where the boy’s father works, told KSAT that Daniel “would just go up and say hi to everybody” at company events.“He was just the nicest person,” he added. “Very grown up for his age.“In a nod to his children, Daniel’s father’s bio on the company website says that “becoming a dad” was one of his biggest achievements.
Daniel Trujillo-Jones and family.GoFundMe
Although Sabedra did not attend the racing event, he found out about it from a number of employees who were there.
“One of our employees saw the car coming, told everybody to run. They all scattered to get out of the way,” he told KSAT.Sabedra has organized two GoFundMe pages:one for the familyandanother for Daniel. He told KSAT that Chance suffered from head trauma and a knee injury, while Walls has “some major leg and pelvic injuries.”
“Chance and his family have a long road of recovery and healing ahead of them. Medical expenses have already started to accumulate,” Sabedra wrote on the family GoFundMe page.
In addition to donations, Sabedra has asked for people to “send all good thoughts and prayers” to Daniel’s “dad and bonus mom,” as well as the boy’s mother, “who has to make the toughest decisions for their boy.”
“No parent should feel the heartbreak of losing a child,” reads a message on Daniel’s fundraiser.
The crash occurred on Saturday afternoon when a car taking part in the “Airport Race Wars 2” drag racing event “lost control and left the runway, crashing into parked vehicles and striking spectators who were observing the races,” the Kerrville Police Department said in astatement.
According to police, a 6-year-old boy died at the scene, while an 8-year-old boy was pronounced dead at a local hospital.
In anupdateon Monday, police said that their initial crash assessment indicated that Gonzales “began to lose control halfway down the 1/8 mile track.” After losing rear traction, his vehicle began to slide on the track, and ultimately “slid off the runway,” according to authorities.
Never miss a story — sign up forPEOPLE’s free weekly newsletterto get the biggest news of the week delivered to your inbox every Friday.Flyin' Diesel Performance, the company that organized the event, released a statement over the weekend, expressing their “most sincere condolences to the families.““We remain in prayer for strength and comfort through this difficult time,” they wrote, noting that the police “have our full cooperation.”
The investigation remains ongoing.
source: people.com
