Kerman community unites for farm workers killed in Madera crash. Here’s how to donate
The friends and family members of four of the farm workers who were killed and one who was hospitalized after a deadly head-on-collision Friday morning have started GoFundMe pages to raise money.
The fundraising efforts are helping return the bodies of those who died to their home states in Mexico.
The collision happened early Friday morning on Avenue 7 near Road 22 in Madera, as a GMC van full of farm workers from Kerman was headed west to a work site and a Chevrolet truck was headed east. Eight men were killed in the crash, including the driver of the Chevrolet, Robert Kovar, 78, of Auberry.
The following pages have been verified by GoFundMe, a spokesperson for the fundraising company said in an email to The Fresno Bee.
▪ Donations for Hector Orozco can be made here.
▪ Donations for Juvenal Jacobo Talavera, from Michoacan, Mexico, can be made here.
▪ Donations for Alfredo Morales, Victor Hernandez, both from Guerrero, Mexico, and the sole survivor of the crash, Benito Perez, can be made here.
California Highway Patrol officer Javier Ruvalcaba said Sunday that Perez required hip surgery and was in serious condition but expected to survive. There was no update on what may have caused the crash.
Kayla Gates, spokesperson for the Madera County Sheriff’s Office, said on Sunday that the department will release the names of all the victims once it has been able to notify all of their families. She said she expects that to be completed early this week.
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David Reyes, a friend of Morales, 28, Hernandez, 30 and Perez, 33, launched the GoFundMe to support the victims’ funeral processions and families.
“They weren’t only my friends but ... family (as well),” he wrote in the GoFundMe post. “I have worked with them for many years and we were friends outside of work. On our weekends, we would catch up any chance we had to hang out and enjoy time away from work.”
Reyes and family members of the victims were overcome with grief Sunday morning during a community-organized sale of Mexican food in Kerman. Dozens of residents of Kerman, a community where many have roots in farm work, showed up to support the families.
“A lot of these people were from Guerrero (in Mexico), and so it’s a very tight-knit farming community here,” said Kerman Mayor Maria Pacheco, who also donated to the fundraiser. “There’s really no words you can put together that can do any good at consoling anybody when you’re going through something like this.”
The families are receiving help from FUERZA, an advocacy group launched by the mayor in Kerman that aids Latino communities. FUERZA is helping the families navigate the process with the Consulate of Mexico to send Morales and Hernandez home.
Lina Orozco, the niece of Hector Orozco, organized his GoFundMe page. She wrote in the fundraising post that Orozco was his family’s main suport, and that his wife and two children are in Mexico.
“He was such a hard working man and loving person,” she wrote about Orozco in the post.
FUERZA will be organizing a vigil for the victims in Kerman this week, said Luz Cabrera, a FUERZA member. A time or date for the vigil had not been determined yet on Monday.
