Thieves stole from father who died pinned under car instead of helping him, family says

PHOENIX (KPHO/Gray News) - A family is mourning the loss of their dad, who died in a freak accident on Monday.

Family members say Jeronimo Garcia Guerra ended up getting pinned under his car after it fell on top of him while he was working on it.

Instead of helping, police say some of the people who saw what happened to Guerra stole from him and took off.

Guerra was driving his wife to work Monday morning when her car broke down in a parking lot in the Phoenix area.

After they were picked up, he drove his daughter’s car back to make repairs to the broken-down car.

“He brought a certain sense of comfort,” Jerry Garcia Jr., the man’s son, said.

Police believe the jack holding the car up collapsed, causing it to crash down on top of him, killing him.

“He always believed nobody out there is going to help you. In this situation, he was right,” Garcia said.

Guerra’s daughter, Monica Garcia, believes her father may have been there for hours.

Monica Garcia said she thinks he got to the parking lot to start work on the car around 9:45 a.m. Police were called around noon.

“Who knows when the car really fell on him,” she said. “Who knows how long he was under there.”

It all happened less than 2 miles away from where Monica Garcia lives.

“After everything, they went through my dad’s pockets and my mom’s car and and took off with my car,” she said.

Monica Garcia says that finding out witnesses stole from her dad instead of stepping in to help adds insult to injury.

“It’s hard because I would never do that to somebody. I could care less about my car but at least they could have stayed there with him until help came,” she said.

The man’s daughter says her car was found the next day abandoned not too far from the scene. But she doesn’t care too much about that.

“That’s somebody’s dad, somebody’s husband, a grandparent, somebody’s best friend. And I don’t have that person anymore because somebody couldn’t stop and check,” Monica Garcia said.

Police haven’t made any immedaite arrests but say there are surveillance cameras in the area they’re looking at.

The family has started a GoFundMe to help them through this difficult time.