NORTH LAS VEGAS, Nev. (KTNV) — It's a painful and devastating loss for one North Las Vegas mother. Her family, including her four children, were killed in a horrific crash over the weekend.
Erlinda Zacarias is the strongest mother you will ever find. And all she is asking for now is for everyone to learn from her loss.
“I never thought this was going to happen to me,” said Zacarias. “My family is gone. All of them were together.”
She spoke to her daughter moments before the collision Saturday afternoon.
“She said, ‘Mom, I’m on my way to you.’ I said, ‘I’ll be waiting here for you.’ They never showed up,” said Zacarias. “I start calling their phones — they don’t answer.”
Her family was gone in an instant. Her brother, two stepchildren, and four genetic children, now a memory.
“From the oldest to the youngest, they left her with nothing,” said Ruben Ceja, a family friend. “We came to her kids’ birthday parties, and I have kids the same age, so it’s really painful, you know?”
The intersection at Cheyenne Avenue and Commerce Street is currently a reminder that a vehicle is not a toy, and to take it easy behind the wheel.
“Just look around at your surroundings,” said Ceja. “Because you could be alright on the street and then somebody just rams you — look, seven lives. Lost.”
A GoFundMe to help pay for the funeral services has already reached over $100,000, showing Zacarias a level of love and support from a community just hoping to remind her that it cares.
“I say to everybody: thank you. Because this loss is a big loss, and I don’t have no ways to take care of this,” said Zararias. “But thank you for helping us.”
All she wants now is to provide herself with some sort of closure, and maybe heal the pain inside.
“Do a service for them. That’s all I can do,” she said. “Because there’s nothing else I can do.”
She spent the day looking for a place to hold the service for her family. There is no finalized information just yet.
MORE COVERAGE FROM 13 ACTION NEWS:
