With balloons, flowers and heavy hearts, mourners on Friday remembered three teenage friends who were killed when the car they were in careened off a street and crashed down an embankment near the LA River in Long Beach.
The crash that happened at 4 a.m. Friday. Killed were Alicia Yanonis, 17, of Long Beach, Armando Herrera and Fabian Cazares, both 19.
A fourth person in the car was hospitalized in the 4 a.m. incident, officials said.
"Why would God do such a thing?" said Araceli Cooper, Yanonis' friend. "She wanted to be a doctor. She was finishing high school. She was going to go to prom."
"That's my older brother ... just knowing that I lost him without even a chance to say goodbye ... it hurts," Heidy Cazares said through tears.
The cause of the crash was under investigation, but speed may have been a factor.
Gee was among the last to see Herrera alive. Herrera's mother asked Gee whether her son was happy in the last moments of his life. She said he was and the two cried.
"All I can do is think about what I could I have done to prevent him from being out in the street so late," Heidy Cazares said.
