Mom arrested for Petaluma crash that killed daughters

Alejandra Hernandez-Ruiz, 27, was arrested on suspicion of manslaughter for the August 2016 crash that killed sisters Sayra, 7, and Delilah Gonzalez, 9.|

A Rohnert Park mother has been arrested on suspicion of manslaughter stemming from a crash last year into the Petaluma River in which her two young daughters became trapped in the car and drowned.

Alejandra Hernandez-Ruiz, 27, was booked Friday in the Aug. 31, 2016 crash that killed sisters Sayra, 7, and Delilah Gonzalez, 9. Her bail was set at $500,000.

Hernandez-Ruiz will appear in court Tuesday morning where she is expected to be charged with two counts of vehicular manslaughter, felony cruelty and driving with a suspended license.

It was unclear exactly what triggered her arrest. It is possible an investigation determined she was driving too fast or unsafely.

A CHP spokesman could not immediately be reached Monday. The District Attorney’s Office did not immediately comment about the case.

The crash happened just after 8 a.m. on Petaluma Boulevard North near Gossage Avenue. Hernandez-Ruiz had dropped off the children’s father and her partner at his work site and was headed to Rohnert Park to take her daughters to Ralph Waldo Emerson Elementary School.

The CHP said the car was in the left lane of the divided four-lane boulevard when it drifted into the median. When Hernandez over-corrected, her Chevy Impala LS shot across the roadway and down a steep 20-foot embankment just north of the Petaluma Village Premium Outlets, crashing through heavy brush and oak trees, before overturning and sliding into a narrow stretch of the river that runs along the boulevard.

The car quickly sank in 6 feet of water and was fully submerged.

One driver who witnessed the crash pulled over and scrambled down the embankment, where he saw the mother standing on the car.

Police officers and firefighters arrived within minutes. They dove in to get the girls, still strapped upside down by their seat belts in the water-filled car, but could not free them in time. The girls were pronounced dead at a Petaluma hospital.

In the immediate aftermath, investigators found no evidence of car or booster seats. State law requires car or booster seats for children until age 8 or they reach a height of 4 feet 9 inches. It was unclear whether the younger girl required one.

A CHP spokesman said Hernandez told investigators she had been cut off in traffic.

The crash mirrored one a week earlier in which two sisters were killed after their family car plunged int the Russian River near Jenner.

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