The folowing is a news report My sister did shortly after her daughter was killed ina accident.. If anyone has teenagers You need to forever remember this..........
An estimated 50,000 young people will journey the streets every day this summer, selling magazines, candy and cleaning products. But before you let your teen take that kind of a job, you’ll want to hear one Mesquite mother’s story.
Just six months after her daughter graduated high school, Karen Oldaker faced teenage independence with an uneasy feeling.
Shamblin Rodriguez, 18, was setting out to sell magazines and see the country.
"She told me about it and she was packing while she was telling me about it. She thought it was such a great deal," said Oldaker.
"She wanted to do it and she wanted to see the world. So, I let her go. I let her go and now she’s not coming back."
Days into her new job, Shamblin saw something else.
"It wasn’t enough to live on. Not for her personal needs, it wasn’t. And that’s the most infuriating thing is - the way she sounded and the way they made it sound to her."
Long hours, in rough parts of town, dreams of finding wealth door-to-door turned over on an interstate highway.
When the crew van flipped, throwing nine passengers into the median in the Arizona desert, two people died, including the always-smiling teen from Mesquite.
"A couple of hours before the accident, I talked to her. She told me they were going to the Grand Canyon on their way to California," Oldaker continued.
"None of her friends have deleted her number from their cell phone. I haven’t even deleted her number from my cell phone."
The Internet is littered with anonymous stories of deception, abuse, exploitation for teens and young adults on their own; they become either stories of survival or death.
The Illinois company that owned the van - Alliance Services Company - did not return our calls, and when a grieving mother had to call them for information.
"They said she was a subcontractor so she didn’t work for them. But yet, their name was on the insurance for the vehicle and I’m sure they paid for the hotel rooms and the meals," said Oldaker.
Another parent turned a similar fatal crash into a crusade for door-to-door sales regulations in Wisconsin. This mom wants Texas to be next.
"I don’t want another kid to go to their parents and say: ’Mom, this is a great deal. I could be making $500/month or more.’ And then, not come home," said Oldaker.
Two people died and four others were seriously injured when a passenger van rolled over on Interstate 17 north of Phoenix Sunday afternoon, closing the highway for several hours, according to an Arizona Department of Public Safety spokesman.
A section of I-17 near the Carefree Highway exit, about 25 miles north of Phoenix, was expected to be closed for three or four hours as state police investigated the fatal crash, DPS Duty Officer Delgado said.
The van, with nine people inside, was northbound when the driver lost control and rolled over, ejecting six passengers, Delgado said. Two of the passengers were killed and four others were airlifted to Phoenix hospitals, he said. (Posted 7:24 p.m.)
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/11/27/sunday/index.html
Thanksgiving travelers returning to the Valley on Sunday afternoon were ensnared in more than five hours of delays after a double-fatal rollover accident on Interstate 17.
A van full of teenage magazine-sales employees on their way to the Grand Canyon rolled into the southbound lanes of I-17 just south of the Carefree Highway, stalling traffic for about 15 miles in both directions, said Department of Public Safety spokesman Frank Valenzuela.
Two of the van's passengers died, and five were critically injured. There were nine passengers in the vehicle
The driver lost control of the van about 12:30 p.m. while traveling northbound, Valenzuela said. It flipped into the median and came to rest in the southbound lanes.
Authorities said that all nine passengers were ejected and that no one was wearing a seat belt. The driver was identified as 20-year-old John Michael Wildf of Kiron, Iowa. The dead passengers had not been identified as of Sunday night.
Medical helicopters landed on I-17 to transport victims to hospitals, which contributed to the northbound backup.
At one point, traffic in both directions was stalled for miles, turning I-17 northbound from the Loop 101 stack and southbound from Black Canyon City into a parking lot.
DPS officers diverted southbound traffic onto the Carefree Highway.
The van carried members of a magazine-sales firm, Alliances Services Co., which has crews largely made up of teens and young adults.
ROLLING MEADOWS (CBS) ? Nine people on a trip to the Grand Canyon were involved in a deadly crash while riding in a van belonging to a suburban Chicago company.
Witnesses to the deadly van crash scene say it's a disturbing sight. The van rolled over on Interstate 17 near Phoenix, Az. Sunday.
CBS 2's Dana Kozlov shows what went wrong.
The van came to a stop upright, after rolling across a Phoenix area highway Sunday afternoon. The plates show it is from Illinois, and investigators say it's hard to believe it was the only vehicle involved.
"It's incredible they didn't hit northbound traffic. They actually squeezed their way as it was sliding sideways between several vehicles, rolled over the median, landed on the southbound lanes, blocked both lanes. Again, it's incredible no one hit them," said Arizona investigator Rich Andrew Peles.
Peles isn't sure what caused the van's driver to veer right on the highway. But he says at least six of the nine passengers were ejected from the van. Two were pronounced dead at the scene.
The van is registered to Alliances Services Company, a magazine sales company based in northwest suburban Rolling Meadows. Investigators say those in the van may have been on their way to the Grand Canyon.
"I'm not sure if they were working out here or just passing through or stationed here, I'm not sure. A lot of them, talking to the passengers, didn't even know each other's names. So, we're not sure how tight knit they were or what they're relationship was like," Peles said.
The company's president told CBS the van was taken without her knowledge, adding her first concern was for any young employees on board. Witnesses, who were caught in a huge traffic back-up, were also shaken by the site.
"It's not a very happy time when something like this happens. And it's a shame those people weren't wearing their seatbelts. They'd probably all still be here, from what I understand," said witness Ron Bennett.
This is not the first time a magazine sales crew like this one has been involved in an accident. One in Janesville, Wis. in 1999 killed seven young people and prompted lawsuits, a series of investigations and pending legislation.
All we know about the teenage passengers in the latest accident are that two are from North Carolina and one from Iowa. The investigation continues.
I post this in MEMORY of my NIECE SHAMBLIN JO
