As a community mourns the loss of four students at Buffalo Grove High School, the mother of one of those victims is devastated, saying that nothing could have prepared her for the pain of losing her son, and other families feel similar grief.
Rickey Bercenas was one of four students killed in a multi-vehicle crash Tuesday night, according to authorities.
Brenda Lorenzo, his mother, says he was a student and a soccer player, and was hanging out with friends just days before their scheduled graduation.
“I said ‘papi, I love you, I’ll see you later.’ He said ‘I love you too.’ That’s the last time I saw him,” she said.
Angelina Gomez’s brother Jesus Rodriguez was also in the vehicle when it was involved in a collision Dundee and Schonebeck Roads. She was driving separately in a vehicle behind the SUV.
“We were just going home. Next thing I know I was behind them and there was a red light,” she said. “Richard thought he could beat it. He tried to brake, but I guess the car wasn’t braking.”
She says she tried to get to her brother after the crash, but couldn’t open the SUV’s door.
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“I tried checking up on my brother,” she said. “He was still breathing. I tried opening the door, but I couldn’t.”
Rodriguez and Barcenas were both killed in the crash, as were 18-year-old Richard De-Ita and 17-year-old Kevin Hernandez-Teran, according to the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office.
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A fifth person in the vehicle remains in an intensive care unit, according to authorities.
The teens are being remembered as good kids with big dreams, with a rapidly-growing memorial resting near the spot where their lives were cut short.
“He was a good student,” Joseph Barcenas said of his cousin Rickey. “He was a good gentleman to his mom. He was a good boy with me, and respectful to every single person.”
Lorenzo is now left to cope with the grief of losing her son, whom she says was always patient and loving to his younger siblings. Now, she wishes she could have been there to save him.
“Just love your kids,” she said. “Try to spend as much time as you can with them.”
A group of students plans to meet at the crash site on Thursday to pay tribute to their classmates.
