Joeb427

iTrader: (1)

14-year-old Calif. girl dies after apparently becoming trapped in car in school parking lot
Published September 13, 2013
FoxNews.com



Graciela Martinez was found dead in the parking lot of Madera South High School. (KMPH)
A 14-year-old California girl died in a high school parking lot after she apparently became trapped in her family’s car when the locking system possibly malfunctioned.
KMPH reports Graciela Martinez was found dead in the BMW 328i Wednesday afternoon in the parking lot of Madera South High School.
Police tell KMPH Graciela and her brother drove to school together, but Graciela stayed in the car when they arrived because she did not start class for another hour.
Her brother returned to the car in the afternoon and found her dead.
Authorities tell KMPH it appears Graciela was trapped inside the vehicle due to some sort of lock malfunction, and the heat of the day contributed to her death. Graciela, who weighed 80 pounds, was apparently unable to break the car window and free herself.
Graciela’s family has put together a candlelight memorial at their home for the girl, the second-oldest of their six children. Graciela’s sister Patricia tells KMPH her sister was a good girl with big goals.
"She was a nice person she came from school and then go to work” Patricia tells KMPH, “and then after work she would help my mom around the house. She didn't have no problems in school or anything she had good grades."
Graciela’s father tells KMPH he purchased the car six months ago from a private party, and there was no indication anything was wrong with the locking sy


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/09/13...#ixzz2es65tDPz

lamar411

Unfotunate, if I remeber correctly in my old RX, if you were sitting inside after the vehicle had been locked with the fob from the outside, it wouldnt let you out. Hitting the door unlock just set off the alarm.

bagwell

sad....RIP

geko29

Very sad, and very strange. Though the buttons themselves are recessed when locked, BMWs have a mechanical unlocking mechanism that works even when there's no battery in the car. You pull the handle once, and the door unlocks, pull it again, and it opens. I can't comprehend how this simple mechanism, even if it failed on one door, would fail on all 4 of them simultaneously, because it's not a central system and no electronics are involved. I wonder if there's a chance that she never tried to get out? Like perhaps she passed out for some other reason, and died before coming out of it.

bruce van

This is just so sad.

I have a coworker who had the same problem with her BMW 3 series. She said she couldn't unlock the doors while inside because of some malfunction and she quickly traded it in at the dealer for a Mini Cooper.

When she took the car to the dealer, they didn't believe her because she couldn't reproduce the problem. Her husband made a big scene and they were able to get out of their lease. After hearing about the death of this poor girl, I'm pretty sure this isn't an isolated incident.

If you do a Google search on the forums, I bet you'll there will be other people who have this problem. So sad...

tex2670

The alarm would go off, but the car still unlocks, right??

tex2670

I'm with you--if they found her dead in the car, how can the know that the lock was not functioning? Something seems missing from this story?

FrankReynoldsCPA

So sad. I wonder if she didn't have a cell phone. Seems that if their parents bought them a BMW, they would have cell phones.

Hoovey689

iTrader: (16)

Good point.

This is very sad nonetheless, but some questions surrounding the circumstances are off

Blackraven

Hmm.........I know it's too early to assume..........but is it possible that the brother would be at fault here (i.e. lack of responsibility for their child, etc.)???

P.S.
On another note:

I find it retarded that the brother would just leave her little sister in the car with the engine off AND WITHOUT AIRCONDITIONING.

If that brother had any care at all, he would leave the car's engine running along with the A/C as well. It shouldn't matter if its costs fuel to keep the A/C running.

If that would've happen, then maybe that little girl wouldn't have to encounter being trapped to death (i.e. like an oven).

mmarshall

Most newer vehicles have a manual emergency release-lever inside the truck or cargo-area if a person is locked inside the trunk. If this particular BMW had one (and if the rear seats could fold) she could have simply dropped the rear seats, crawled into the cargo area if there was enough room under the shelf, grabbed the emergency-lever, and let herself out. Of course, that's several different IFs, each of which may or may not have been possible. Either way, it's a shame she passed away. RIP...and condolences to her family.

I8ABMR

That is so sad. I can only imagine how the family feels

FrankReynoldsCPA

Most people wouldn't likely know that.

SteVTEC

WTF??? $11k 328i is probably an 07/08 E90 which is recent.

That's terrible!

I'm going to go dork around with the locks on my car and see what's up, but yeah I never leave anybody in a car without keys because YES, they're an oven and can get hot REALLY QUICK without ventilation.

SteVTEC

Okay I just tried, on my '11 E93.

If you're sitting in the car and the person you're riding with leaves you in it, takes the keys, and locks it with the fob from the outside, no you cannot open the car doors by pulling the handle, and as the locks are recessed you can't pull them up either. What you have to do is hit the central door lock/unlock button, which is right in the middle of the center console near the emergency flasher button. Once you open the door the alarm goes off, but whatever. At least on my E93, it's a small button, one that would unfortunately be easy to miss. There's definitely a proper way out of the car though, without doing anything elaborate.

Tragic either way.