KVOA

Posted: Nov 6, 2009 10:00 PM
Updated: Nov 9, 2009 9:47 AM

ALICE - An Alice family is mourning the loss of their 2-year old daughter, who died Thursday after being hit by a car.

Allena Garcia was hit right in front of her home in the 300 block of Staples Street, but it's still not clear just how it happened.

Her parents, Rafael and Jessica Garcia, say Rafael walked out to his pickup and left for work, thinking all the kids had followed their mother inside the house.

Moments later, Jessica found her lying in the street.

"I thought she was playing," she said, "I thought she was lying down on the floor playing. I got closer to her, I saw all the blood. I turned here over, I saw the big cut right across her head. I carried her, took her inside the house, looked for the phone."

Allena was first taken to Christus Spohn Alice, then Halo-flighted to Driscoll Children's Hospital.

Alice Police questioned her parents for two hours before letting them leave.

"We didn't get to Corpus till 12:30," said Jessica.

Her parents were at the hospital only minutes before doctors told them that they would not be able to save Allena.

"She had a pulse, and her blood pressue had gone back, but there was just too much damage to her head. There was nothing else they could do," says her mother.

Rafael doesn't remember hearing Allena or feeling like he hit anything when driving off, and the family can't believe she made it to the street without him noticing.

"If she was coming behind him, he would have felt her coming," Jessica explained, "because we're so used to that. The kids follow us."

Police took Rafael's pickup to examine it for evidence, and a blood sample from Rafael to test for drugs or alcohol, but told the family at this point, what happened was most likely a tragic accident.

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