Animal-loving Turlock teen dies from injuries suffered when a truck hit her, her horse
A Turlock teen hit by a truck while riding her horse died Saturday, according to her family. “We are torn. Our worst fear has become true,” Summer Vigil-Gardner’s mother, Regina, told The Bee in a text message Sunday morning.
Summer, 19, was sent to Doctors Medical Center after suffering a severe brain injury from the Wednesday crash. She had no brain activity and was taken off life support.
“My baby girl fought so hard,” her mother said, and now Summer’s siblings are suffering a pain she can’t take away. “As a mother, that’s the worst feeling.”
Summer and her family were so close, never letting a day go by without saying, “I love you,” and being together even if just through a video call, Regina Gardner-Vigil said. And while Summer was on life support, “I have been here with my daughter day and night (and) want to go with her.”
Summer attended Pitman High School and dreamed for a horse since she was a child, her mother, Regina Vigil-Gardner said. She gave Riggs to Summer for her 18th birthday. The two were inseparable, Vigil-Gardner said last week, and she rode or walked Riggs on a route near their home for the past year every day.
The teenager was riding Riggs on their regular route when the driver of a Chevrolet Silverado hit them Wednesday morning, Vigil-Gardner said. Riggs died at the scene.
Just an hour before the crash, Vigil-Gardner said she pulled up next to the best friends and told her daughter to get home safely and move her goat to another pen. While they talked, Riggs stuck his face in the car to say hello, she said.
Her daughter stood up for people and did not sugar-coat things when she saw someone doing something she thought was wrong, Vigil-Gardner said. She gave food to homeless people and really connected with animals. She recently begged to adopt a three-legged pig, telling her mother the pig would be killed otherwise.
“She always wants to do stuff for other people all the time,” Vigil-Gardner said. “If she sees a stray dog, she jumps out of the car, gets it and we make sure if it has tags we take it to the dog pound, get it scanned and see what we have to do to find its owners.”
Summer wanted to work in a veterinary hospital in the future, Vigil-Gardner said. She planned to go into an adult program because she didn’t finish high school during the pandemic.
For medical and legal fees, the family is seeking donations on GoFundMe. The family is looking into suing the driver who hit her, she added. The driver, 27-year-old Isaac Leal of Delhi, told investigators he was reaching down for a bottle of water and didn’t see Summer until the last minute, authorities previously told The Bee.
“This could have been prevented,” Vigil-Gardner said last week. “This is something that should’ve never happened to anybody, whatever the circumstances. This is negligence.”
In her text Sunday, Summer’s mother added, “He will be able to see and call and return to his family. I will have to wait till I am called home to heaven to see my baby girl.”
This story was originally published August 15, 2021 at 9:24 AM.