Tuesday, March 15, 2005 | 11 a.m.
Vergus Bailey heard a crash outside her apartment Monday morning and looked outside, not knowing her 36-year-old daughter was among the people killed when a sport utility vehicle plowed into a Citizens Area Transit bus shelter in northwest Las Vegas.
Samantha Gail Allen and three Cimarron-Memorial High School students, 14-year-old Angelica Jimenez, her sister Raquel Jimenez and Reginald E. Williams, both 16, died after Veronica Schmidt, 34, lost control of her Ford Explorer on Smoke Ranch Road at Rock Springs Drive about 7:15 a.m. Monday.
Bailey described her daughter, who worked at Family Dollar store, as happy-go-lucky.
"We're just trying to hold it together," Bailey said. "The sad part about it, (is) I went to the fence, I saw the accident, and I didn't know my daughter was against the wall. I saw it and came back into the house."
Allen, Williams and one of the girls were pronounced dead at the scene. The other girl died shortly after being brought to University Medical Center.
Grief counselors were at Cimarron-Memorial High School, 2301 N. Tenaya Way, this morning to try to help students deal with the loss of three of their classmates.
The approximately 3,500 students at the school appeared to carry on as usual this morning, with many participating in "Mismatch Day," part of a weeklong series of special days in which kids are encouraged to wear certain outfits on particular days.
A crisis center was set up in case students wanted to talk about their feelings regarding the wreck.
"This is a tough situation," Clark County School District spokeswoman Pat Nelson said. "It has to be business as usual at the school, but with the sensitivity to give students and staff the extra help that they need.
"People are always impacted because a school is a family system."
Although officials tried to make it a normal day, one event was canceled out of respect for the students who died.
Every Tuesday the school hosts an "American Idol" party in which students gather in the gym to cheer on and vote for Cimarron student Mikalah Gordon, 17, who is on the TV show, but that has been called off, Nelson said.
Metro Police are continuing their investigation into the crash.
Although police said Allen and the three students appeared to have been waiting at the bus stop, Bailey said her daughter was passing by. Her routine was to walk to another bus stop, which took her to work at Family Dollar across town.
Further, that bus would have taken the students away from the school.
"Maybe they (the students) decided to meet there. We're curious ourselves," Sgt. Tracy McDonald of the department's fatal detail said.
With wrecks that left nine other people dead over the weekend, detectives haven't yet had the chance to speak to the family members of the victims in Monday's crash as of this morning, they said.
Officials from the coroner's office came to the apartment in the Fountains at Smoke Ranch complex that Bailey shared with Allen and another daughter and notified her of Allen's death in the late afternoon, she said.
Bailey said that earlier in the day, when she had looked outside at the wreck, she saw Schmidt and felt sorry for her.
"I'm not sure how I feel about her now," she said.
Initially police said Schmidt was impaired, and failed a field sobriety test. She was taken to the Clark County Detention Center, but wasn't booked.
Police released her shortly after the wreck, saying they had no probable cause to hold her.
However, charges are expected to be filed at a later date, Metro Police Sgt. Chris Jones, police spokesman, said.
"It's too early in the investigation to say what she will be charged with," Jones said. "It will be largely based on blood draws."
After talking to Schmidt and her husband, police said she might have been experiencing a medical problem, or she might have fallen asleep as a result of a medical problem, or she might have been on medication that impaired her driving.
Schmidt's blood will be analyzed to determine what, if any, substances were in her system. It could take several weeks for police to get the results of toxicology tests.
"She's being very cooperative," Jones said. "At the scene it appeared she was impaired, but she might have been in shock over what had happened."
Even if police determine Schmidt wasn't impaired, she will still be charged or cited with a traffic violation, police said. Speed does not appear to be a factor in the crash, police said.
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