Police are still looking for the suspects who fled the Camaro after the wreck, as well as those who stole it three days earlier.
SAN ANTONIO — A fifth person has died after San Antonio police said a stolen, speeding Camaro caused the bus they were riding in to wreck on the southwest side last week.
The Bexar County medical examiner identified the latest victim as 79-year-old Judith Paulsel, who died at Brooke Army Medical Center and is the oldest person killed as a result of Thursday afternoon’s crash along Interstate 35. The others are 78-year-old Maria del Rosario Sanchez; 69-year-old Rosalio Aguilera; 50-year-old Jose Hector Guerra, who was driving the bus at the time; and 42-year-old Alicia Yaneth Cisneros Gonzalez.
They and more than a dozen others who were hurt in the crash were en route to Mexico from Fort Worth, according to a representative with the bus company Transportes Guerra. The bus was making its way down I-35 South near Leon Creek when police said the Camara hit the trailer it was pulling, causing the bus to lose control and roll over.
Four people, including one who was armed with an AK-style rifle, hopped out of the Camaro and fled the scene, according to officials. As of Tuesday, they have yet to be found.
Surveillance video obtained by KENS 5 shows the moments when two men stole that very Camaro from a driveway in northeast Bexar County on Monday, July 14, three days before it was involved in the fatal crash. Police confirmed it’s the same car at the center of both incidents.
The two suspects seen in the video have not, however, been named suspects in the crash. It’s unknown if they were in the car when it went speeding down I-35.
“The cars can be replaced. You can’t replace a life,” the owner of the stolen car told KENS 5.
Officials with University Hospital said that, out of the 15 people initially brought there to be treated after the crash, two adults remain in their care as of Tuesday.
Remembering the victims
Miguel Guerra, Jose Guerra’s brother, told our sister station WFAA that his brother was the owner of Transportes Guerra, having started the company over 20 years ago. In a phone interview with WFAA, Guerra’s wife described him as a hard-working man who was committed to his family and serving the North Texas community.
“He dedicated his life to his business and, sadly, he passed away doing business,” she said, speaking in Spanish. “He was a great person. He was very hardworking, dedicated to his kids, to his family and community.”
WFAA also confirmed that Gonzalez, a mother of three, was heading back to her hometown of Nueva Rosita in Coahuila, Mexico, after visiting her brother in Austin.
Multiple family members of Sanchez told WFAA that she was a Mexican resident who was visiting her children and grandchildren in North Texas before the crash.