Friends, Family Bid Farewell To Heroic Mother

Family and friends of a young mother killed on I-10 gathered to say goodbye.

Twenty-five-year-old Karla Cerino died in a fiery wreck last week, just moments after helping her children out of a burning SUV.

“She was my coffee buddy,” said relative Gilbert Morin. “When she entered the room, her laugh filled the house. She was always willing to help out anybody who was in need.”

Mourners sobbed and hugged outside Our Lady of Sorrows Church in the Lower Valley, where family members and friends gathered for Karla’s mass and remembered her compassion.

Speaking Spanish, Fransisco Cerino, Karla’s uncle, said when he hurt his leg in an accident, Karla came by every day and told him: Do your best. You’re going to come out ahead.

He said now Karla’s two-year-old son Edgar, who suffered minor injuries in the crash, picks up a toy phone and pretends to speak to his mom.

He’s still too young to understand what happened.

Edgar has also asked for his sister, eight-year-old Priscilla, whose face and arms were burned so badly in last Wednesday’s crash that she’ll likely spend months at a Lubbock hospital.

Right now she’s sedated to help with her pain, and not fully aware of what’s happened. “They’ve started putting a latex material on her hands so they can start doing the grafts,” Morin said.

Up until a few weeks before the crash, Priscilla was a third grader at R.E.L. Washington Elementary School in East El Paso.

Some of her former classmates there made a banner of support, which they’ve presented to the family to pass along to Priscilla.

Family members said they are very grateful to the strangers who helped Karla and her kids on the side of the road.

Two of those good samaritans met Karla’s relatives. “It was really emotional – meeting two angels is what it was,” Morin said.