Antioch sisters, 2 and 4, die after stolen-car crash

Two little girls died within days of each other after an autotheft suspect fleeing from law enforcement allegedly ran a red light and crashed into the vehicle their mother was driving in Antioch.

Laura Cardoza said her 4year-old niece, Lenexy, loved dressing up as Elsa from the Disney movie “Frozen.” The girl pranced around her Antioch home, belting out, “Let it go, let it go,” while her 2-year-old sister, Camila, often followed her lead and jumped up and down as the movie played on the family television.

Lenexy Cardoza was killed in the accident Wednesday, while Camila was on life-support until Sunday, the aunt said. On Sunday evening, the family confirmed the younger sister had succumbed to her injuries.

“We are hanging in there,” Laura Cardoza said in a phone interview Monday. “The girls were the only girls from the family. We all had boys and my mother-in-law had all boys, so it hurts more that we don’t have our girls.”

The girls’ mother, Edith, is still recovering in the intensive care unit.

“The mom, physically, is doing OK, but mentally she is devastated — those were her babies,” Laura Cardoza said.

The suspect, 23-year-old Noe Saucedo of Pittsburg, was arrested on suspicion of murder and evading police. Prosecutors filed a second charge of murder Monday morning after Lenexy’s death. Saucedo is being held at Martinez Detention Facility in lieu of $1.05 million bail.

The Contra Costa Sheriff ’s Office received reports of a stolen Ford F-250 pickup truck out of Pittsburg about 12:45 p.m., authorities said. Deputies followed a vehicle matching the description of the stolen truck from Bailey Road onto eastbound Highway 4, where Saucedo allegedly sped off at the Somersville Road exit.

Saucedo ran a red light at Somersville Road and then crashed into a southbound Ford F-150 carrying the two girls and their mother, authorities said.

Since then, the family has been reeling from the sudden loss of the girls. Laura Cardoza said she’s had a hard time telling her 3-year-old son, Luis Angel, that their cousins are gone.

“It breaks my heart because he asks for them,” she said. “And now he won’t be able to play with his cousins.”

The aunt said her last memory of the girls is from shortly after Christmas, when the two tried to apply makeup to her husband’s face as he lay snoring on the couch.

“When he woke up, they just started to laugh,” she said.

The girls are survived by their mother, father and an 11-year-old brother. A Go Fund Me account has been set up for the family.