BY CRAIG SHULTZ
Katie Fernandes will walk with some 500 other Hemet High graduates during commencement ceremonies Thursday, May 30, at the Ramona Bowl. A year ago, Fernandes didn’t know whether she ever would walk again. Fernandes, 18, was among those injured when a fellow student drove into a group of about 30 teens at a crosswalk on May 30, 2012, the final day of school. Standing near the Stetson Avenue crosswalk on Tuesday, May 28, Fernandes said she is concerned that it is no safer now than it was when she was hurt. “I’m not mad at the driver,” she said. “I’m mad that nothing’s been done. Not much has changed.” She’s worried that other students could get hurt, she said. “When the last bell rings, I know kids are in the crosswalk and I know it’s not safe,” she said. “If it happens again, it will be (hanging) over my head, knowing we could have done something to prevent it and we didn’t.” There has been talk of adding signs warning drivers or shortening a dividing fence in the median to make it easier to see pedestrians, but nothing has been done. Drivers on Stetson, a major east-west route through southern Hemet, still speed and run the stoplights, campus workers said. The fence in the median is dented in two places. On Wednesday afternoon, Hemet High Principal Emily Shaw was supervising the crosswalk after school and a highway patrol vehicle was parked nearby. Shaw said teens were offered safe driving instruction after the crash. “I think the kids are more aware to pay attention,” the principal said. The high school is outside Hemet’s city limits, so the city doesn’t control the intersection. A legislative team member for County Supervisor Jeff Stone’s office said she was researching safety issues with the county transportation department, but did not respond back by Wednesday evening. Fernandes avoids the crosswalk. If she needs to cross the street, she gets rides from her father, Al Fernandes, the school’s longtime activities director. The truck ran over her right leg, tearing her medial collateral ligament, rupturing her anterior cruciate ligament and fracturing her fibula. She bruised her skull on the pavement when she fell and a year later still has remnants of road rash on her arms and legs. She underwent surgery for her leg injuries in March and has at least12 more physical therapy sessions scheduled as she prepares to attend Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in the fall to study agricultural science. THE CRASH Hemet High School sits on the south side of Stetson, between Dartmouth and Stanford streets. The football stadium and student parking lot are on the north side. A concrete median with a tall metal fence runs along the middle of the street, except for a gap where a signaled crosswalk allows pedestrians to cross. That’s where the crash occurred. Daniel Carillo, then18, who had received his driver’s license just 15 days earlier, plowed his pickup into a group of students who were leaving school for the day. Carillo said his brakes failed, a notion that initially was dismissed by the California Highway Patrol. The CHP later verified that brake failure was the cause of the crash. Fernandes was one of eight students who required hospitalization. The most seriously hurt, Helen Richardson, spent a week in a coma and suffered brain damage. She is recovering and taking independent study courses. Al Fernandes, who has worked at the school more than 30 years, said he often has been called to assist when a student is injured. This time it was different. “The difficult part was seeing your own child in the middle of the road,” he said. “To see your own child really hits hard.” THE AFTERMATH Fernandes said her injuries caused her to miss out on some activities during her senior year. An active participant in FFA, she had to skip competitions because of her limited mobility. She missed her brother’s college graduation last spring and said her grades are down a bit this year. She had surgery at the end of March so she would be healthy enough to walk with her classmates at graduation. The nightmares have stopped, she said, but not the vivid memories of the crash. She still is skittish at crosswalks, she said. “I’m very hesitant,” she said. “I get nervous.” It was unusual that Fernandes was crossing the street that day. She rarely used the crosswalk but did that day so she could help her father pass out caps and gowns in the stadium. After the crash, a parent committee established a scholarship fund for injured students called Hope, Healing and a Brighter Future, Shaw said. Two of the injured seniors were to receive the scholarships Wednesday night. Follow Craig Shultz on Twitter @PE_CraigShultz and online at blog. pe.com/hemet