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CNN Saturday Morning News
Families of Flight 587 Victims Mourn
Aired November 17, 2001 - 07:19 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: The tragedy of Flight 587 and the crash has touched many, both in New York and in the Dominican Republic. But for one Dominican woman, her loss has created another burden.
CNN's Michael Okwu has the details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Since Monday, Jacqueline Valdez hasn't talked much with her 9-year-old daughter, Francesca. Words, she says, are hard to bear. Comfort comes with an arm around a neck, a glass of water.
Valdez lost Francesca's father, Wilman Rosa (ph), her common-law husband of 12 years, in Monday's crash. That night she left their home in Orlando for New York.
JACQUELINE VALDEZ (through translator): I had to come here to find out exactly what happened, to find out if he was still alive, because when I came here, I still had hope.
OKWU: Hope, and then fear. Valdez, who's been in the country for 13 years, was afraid to step forward as next of kin because she's an illegal alien. Now she wants Congress to grant her and others amnesty so they can return to the United States after burying their loved ones in the Dominican Republic.
Democratic Congressman Jose Serrano is trying to make it happen.
REP. JOSE SERRANO (D), NEW YORK: Perhaps in a unique way, we sort of look the other way as they leave and enter the country.
OKWU (on camera): Are you willing to risk everything in order to have your husband receive a proper burial?
VALDEZ: Yes. I'm not going to send my daughter alone, and I don't want his body to go alone either. And I will never feel fulfilled until I've taken him to his final resting place.
OKWU: While Jacqueline Valdez worries about whether she'll be able to return to the United States, some Dominicans are now voicing other concerns. FERNANDO MATEO, DOMINICAN ADVOCATE: And still the families of the Dominican people that were on this flight have not received a dime from American Airlines.
OKWU (voice-over): Fernando Mateo, an advocate for New York's Dominican community, has provided comfort for Valdez and others. He charges that American Airlines has been too slow in compensating families who lost loved ones on flight 587. He says American issued payments within two days after a 1999 crash in Little Rock, and after the World Trade Center attacks.
Contacted by CNN Friday, American Airlines says checks could be written any day now. American Airlines needs to determine legitimate next of kin. It will meet every reasonable request of family members.
But for Jacqueline Valdez, that may not be enough.
VALDEZ: For all that they do, and for all that they give, there is no money that will bring his life back.
OKWU: Michael Okwu, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: At a church near the crash site, mourners spilled into the sidewalks outside. They bid farewell to a mother and a son who are among the five people killed when flight 587 slammed into their Queens neighborhood.
CNN's Brian Cabell was there.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRIAN CABELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The mourning hardly ever seems to stop here at St. Francis de Sales Church in Rockaway.
Twelve St. Francis parishioners perished in the World Trade Center attack, five more when flight 587 crashed on Monday. The crowds, many with sunglasses to block out the sun and hide the tears, flow out onto the street for the funerals. There is no room for them inside, so they stand for hours at a time.
They mourn the deaths of Kathy Lawlor (ph) and her son, Christopher, who were in their home when flight 587 fell from the sky. Of Kathy, friends tell you she loved the surf and the sand right down the block from her home. She loved shopping here in the modest town of Belle Harbor.
But above all, she adored her family.
PETER PATTERSON, MOURNER: She was a mother who was like a typical lioness mother, watching out for her kids, and whether they were 24 years old or 15 years old.
CABELL: Christopher was 24 when he died, a St. John's law student, a local boy who was making good.
DANNY NOONAN, MOURNER: He's a Rockaputian (ph), as we would say. He (UNINTELLIGIBLE) with everybody from the community. He was involved in all those sports, and everybody in the community, him and his friends, you know what I mean? It was another generation of Rockaway people.
CABELL: This is a town of second- and third-generation families who've discovered you can live both near Manhattan and along the beach, a little stretch of paradise, they consider it.
But a paradise whose Catholic church has suddenly lost 17 people.
MSGR. MARTIN GERAGHTY, FRANCIS DE SALES CHURCH: I know where they were in church. I know their families. I knew who they were with. And when I see a family member, I know who's missing. So I miss them.
CABELL: These are sad times in Rockaway, times when police and bagpipers and hearses fill the streets, times when planes overhead provoke just a moment of anxiety.
Brian Cabell, CNN, Rockaway, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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