Keyla Salazar was enjoying ice cream with her family Sunday evening at theGilroy Garlic Festival when the sound of gunfire caused panicand people started fleeing.
But rather than run, the 13-year-old stayed behind to keep pace with a relative using a cane — and left herself in the path of a fatal bullet that may have saved another, according to the girl’s aunt, Katiuska Pimentel Vargas, who spoke with theAssociated Press.
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Twelve others were injured.
“Unfortunately, my niece Keyla was not able to make it and died at the scene,” her aunt wrote ina Facebook post. “I have no words to describe this pain I’m feeling, Keyla you are an angel and we will miss you with all of our hearts. You were too young to be taken from us.”
“We are all devastated and broken and need time to heal and process,” she wrote.
The teen would have turned 14 on August 4, and “really cared a lot about other people,” said her aunt. “She loved animals. She had big dreams and aspirations, and her life was cut short.”
“She was just, like, a really caring, friendly kid who really liked to help people,” she said.
AGoFundMe account has been set upto support the San Jose girl’s family.
Festivalgoers leave Christmas Hill Park after a deadly shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival, in Gilroy, California.Noah Berger/AP/Shutterstock
Records revealed the gunman had purchased his weapon legally in Nevada on July 9, he said.
At a candlelight vigil on Monday night, Gilroy Mayor Roland Velasco drew cheers when he said the community “cannot let the bastard that did this tear us down,” reportsKRON.
Gilroy is a city of about 50,000 people located 20 miles south of San Jose that draws 100,000 to the annual food and music festival celebrating its claim as the “Garlic Capital of the World,”the Associated Press reports.
source: people.com
