It started with a bad breakup between high school sweethearts.
It ended with a 5 a.m. car wreck that killed two Immokalee teenagers — Amanda Alvarado and Michael Jon Perez.
From her hospital bed, 22-year-old Beatriz Martinez, the only survivor, tells a tale of an angry boyfriend who followed through on a threat to cause the crash. He was trying to stop the car his girlfriend was riding in.
Martinez was close with both Alvarado, who was her cousin, and Perez, an Immokalee High School senior set to graduate on Friday. She said the news is difficult to process.
“They were both wonderful (people),” Martinez said. “They loved to get along with everyone and have fun.”
In a phone interview Tuesday, the Lehigh Acres resident painted a picture of the hours leading up to the Monday morning crash, saying Alvarado and Perez — 17-year-olds who had been dating for a couple of years and were living together at Alvarado’s home — argued earlier in the day after attending a party.
Martinez, who said she would do anything for her cousin, gladly made the more than 30 minute trip to Immokalee when Alvarado called at 2 a.m. Alvarado was throwing Perez’s things out of the house when Martinez arrived, and told her “it wasn’t working out between her and him.”
“She said it was done,” Martinez said.
Alvarado then asked to stay with Martinez, and returned to Martinez’s home around 3:30 a.m.
They weren’t home long before Perez started calling, and he and Alvarado got into another argument. Martinez said Perez put Alvarado’s mother on the phone, who urged her to come home.
Martinez said she told Alvarado she’d take her home because she didn’t want to get her in trouble with her mother. Not long after arriving in Lehigh Acres she was again on her way back to Immokalee.
But the ride back to town was fraught with angry phone calls from Perez.
Perez called Alvarado several times, Martinez said, and even said he’d be waiting for them on State Road 82.
He kept his word, Martinez said.
When Martinez approached the intersection of State Road 82 and State Road 29 in her 2010 Dodge Charger, Perez got out of his 2004 Hyundai Elantra and banged on her windows.
She unbuckled her seat belt to get out of the car and tell him to stop, but Martinez said Alvarado told her to just take her home.
The phone calls started up again as they drove past the first curve on Westclox Street. Martinez said that’s when Alvarado eventually answered the phone, Perez told her to get Martinez to stop the car. Perez even told Alvarado that if she didn’t stop he was going to crash into them, Martinez said.
Alvarado told him she was going home, and hung up the phone.
Martinez said she looked in the rear view mirror to see where Perez was. The next thing she knew he hit the side of the car.
The Florida Highway Patrol reported that as Perez overtook Martinez’s vehicle, he struck the right side of her car, causing both vehicles to spin out.
Perez’s Hyundai overturned twice, and struck a utility pole and electric box before it crashed into a mobile home. He was not wearing a seat belt and was ejected from the vehicle.
Martinez’s Dodge struck the shoulder, overturned and struck a barbed wire fence. Both women were ejected. Neither was wearing a seat belt.
Martinez said she “was really in pain” but was able to get up and went to see if her cousin was OK. Alvarado said she was, Martinez said.
Alvarado was transported to a hospital first. Martinez said when she arrived later no one would tell her how her cousin was.
Alvarado was a junior at the PACE Center for Girls. Friends earlier said they thought she attended Immokalee High.
Martinez said Alvarado didn’t know what she was going to do after she graduated, but she knew “she wanted to get a part-time job and save up so she could get her own vehicle and go to school.”
School counselors and school psychologists were on hand Tuesday at the PACE Center and at Immokalee High School. School officials said members of the district’s crisis team were ready to help out when needed.
“It’s not good,” said Marianne Kearns, executive director of the local PACE Center. “Students are obviously having difficulty. We are trying to help them through this and do the best that we can.”
Perez was on an Immokalee High graduation list provided to the Daily News. He was a trumpet player in the high school band, NBC-2 reported.
“It’s just tragic, that we have lost two young people,” Immokalee High School principal Mary Murray said.
Drew Perez, Michael Perez’s brother, told the Daily News on Monday his brother was a good student who did his best to stay out of trouble.
“He was good,” Drew Perez said. “There ain’t nothing bad about him.”
Martinez said she was holding up and suffering from a few broken bones. She was still in the hospital early Tuesday afternoon.
Martinez said was shaken up from the accident, and hoping to get home soon to continue her recovery.
“I’m trying to be strong and recover from everything that happened,” she said. “I’m just trying to be strong.”
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