San Diego

Family Remembers Teen Killed in Crash on I-8 in Grantville

A passenger who lived through a car crash last week on Interstate 8 that killed one of his friends wants to know why the driver took off from the scene.

“Why’d you run?” is the only question Ralston Prince, 20, has for 20-year-old Sajjad Ismael, the man behind the wheel in the deadly crash in Grantville last Thursday.

The CHP said Ismael was speeding before he rear-ended another car and lost control.

The car went up a hillside separating east and westbound lanes, struck several trees and rolled back down onto the freeway.

Eighteen-year-old Isaac Garcia lost his life in the crash just weeks before he was supposed to graduate from Grossmont Secondary Charter School.

Ismael ran from the crash and was arrested minutes later on a nearby freeway off-ramp. He was charged Monday with gross vehicular manslaughter, hit and run causing death and driving on a suspended license.

Family, friends, and classmates of Garcia gathered at Renette Park in El Cajon Tuesday night to honor his life.

There, Prince described his friend as “Loving, caring and a real good person.”

“If you were his friend he then would do anything in his power to help you out,” Prince said of Garcia who has been his friend since 8th grade.

Garcia’s family members are still trying to wrap their heads around the fact that he is gone.

“It's something that we never expected to happen and it happened and now we have to, you know, learn to live with it,” Garcia’s aunt Maria Valdez said.

A GoFundMe page has been set up in Garcia's honor.

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