Teen hit by car, killed in Oakley; driver's toxicology results pending
OAKLEY, Calif. (KTVU) - A family is seeking changes to a rural stretch of road one day after their loved one was hit and killed by a car in Oakley.
Roshel Madlangbayan was walking with a friend on E. Cypress Road near Bethel Island Road on Tuesday when a car veered off the road and hit the two girls head-on. Madlangbayan did not survive. Her 16-year-old friend is at USCF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland with head trauma and multiple leg fractures.
Madlangbayan’s uncle and aunt, Oscar and Rowena Mendez, said their niece was quiet, shy, and very intelligent.
“She shouldn’t be taken from this world,” Oscar Mendez said. “She was a kind person. She had a bright future ahead of her.”
The couple said their niece never made it home after spending time with her best friend at a community pool in Oakley.
“This is actually one of the rare occasions that she got permission to go,” Rowena Mendez said. “It’s just so tragic that my niece was taken away from us so early.”
Lt. Eric Navarro with the Oakley Police Department said the driver, 50-year-old Kristina Salvitti, stopped after the crash and cooperated with investigators. They believe she may have been driving under the influence of drugs, possibly prescription medications. Police are awaiting the results of a toxicology test to determine if drugs were in Salvitti’s system.
“She claimed initially that she had blacked out several times,” Navarro said. “She remembers driving and striking some pedestrians, but doesn’t remember fine details of the crash.”
Navarro said Salvitti has no criminal history and appeared to be living out of her car. He said she did not have a valid driver’s license and the car’s registration tags were expired.
Salvitti is facing vehicular manslaughter and impaired driving charges, but she will likely be released from jail soon. Oakley PD said it would take several weeks before the results of the toxicology test return and they hand over their case to the Contra Costa District Attorney’s Office for prosecution.
Madlangbayan’s family said the rural road does not have a shoulder lane and there are no sidewalks. They said those factors mixed with speeding drivers make for a dangerous combination.
“Sometimes I would walk the trail by there and nobody stops for me,” he said. “I always look out for people. They don’t stop for me. They just head like it’s a race or something like that.”
Madlangbayan’s family hopes her death can lead to changes on that stretch of road.
Navarro said it is unclear how fast Salvitti was traveling, but the speed limit on E. Cypress Road is 50 miles per hour. He said it is not uncommon for drivers to speed through the area and enforcing the speed limit can be difficult because there is not a shoulder lane to pull cars over.
Navarro said any changes to the speed limit or installing sidewalks would be at the discretion of the city’s engineering and planning department.
Mendez said his niece was set to start her sophomore year at Freedom High School in Oakley. She had aspirations of being a chef.
“The sky was the limit for her because she was very intelligent,” he said. “She really put a lot of work into her studies. She got good grades. She was on the honor roll. Good kid, very kind. She is going to be missed in this world.”