A 5-year-old and his father are recovering from extensive injuries after getting struck by a car and dragged through a Trader Joe’s in Castro Valley. Stephanie Magallon reports.
A 5-year-old and his father are recovering from extensive injuries after getting struck by a car and dragged through a Trader Joe’s in Castro Valley.
“I was putting my wallet back into my back pocket, I heard an engine rev, a window crash and seconds before, the car had struck us from behind,” said Hayward resident Osvaldo Ledesma.
The crash happened as he was checking out of the Trader Joe's on Redwood Road.
He was with his 5-year-old son Benjamin and his daughter Ciel. She dodged the impact but Osvaldo and Benjamin didn’t.
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“I tried to reach for my son to pick him up, but it was too late. There after the car pushed us against the cash register, the counter, which pinned us standing up and just kept pushing us as if it were a tsunami,” said Osvaldo.
Six others were also injured. Police said and the 90-year-old driver who hit them is cooperating with officers.
“There were people screaming,” said Osvaldo, who two weeks later, still remembers the chaotic scene and how frightened he was as he saw his son dragged along his side with tears of agony.
“He had a broken right hip, which required three pins to keep it stabilized. He had a broken pelvis, a broken left shoulder and of course, the drag burn tire burn on his left thigh,” said the father.
Benjamin spent four nights at a children's hospital after undergoing surgery and he may also need plastic surgery for his thigh.
“It’s still in question if he’ll make a full recovery as a normal 5-year-old,” said Osvaldo, who has to stay off his feet for at least four more weeks.
He has a sprained right ankle and a fractured left knee.
Osvaldo said he’s had to turn down jobs due to his injuries and his wife took time off work to care for them, so the bills are piling up.
“Right now it's just limbo, we're just going day to day and then, figuring it out as we go,” said Osvaldo.
Friends created a GoFundMe page to help with those expenses and any future medical visits.
But this father and son are just glad that their family is together.
Osvaldo said he would really like to see storefront businesses put up barriers to protect their customers and calls on the DMV to take a deeper look at elder drivers coming in to renew their driver's license.
