Woman dies 11 years after hit-and-run
SAN JOSE >> Police are reopening a 2011 hit-and-run case because a former Los Gatos High School student died a decade after a driver hit her at an intersection near Cambrian Park and left her with debilitating injuries, authorities said.
Shea Shaw, a Campbell resident who was then 15, was with her boyfriend around 1:10 a.m. Jan. 8, 2011, at the intersection of Camden and Bascom avenues when she was hit by a motorist traveling east on Camden in a gray or silver early-2000s sedan, according to San Jose police. The driver fled.
The only video of the collision was grainy surveillance footage from a nearby gas station, and the case has remained unsolved. San Jose police said in light of her death, “The hit-andrun investigation will be reopened in an effort to generate leads.”
Her father told this news organization in 2011 that his daughter and her boyfriend had just left a party and were acting playfully in a grassy area when she ran out ahead of the boyfriend and the car hit her.
An outpouring of community support emerged in the wake of the collision, which left Shaw with serious head and internal injuries and broken bones. She was a popular student at Los Gatos High known for her exuberant personality and was a cheerleader for the school the year before the collision.
The collision initially left Shaw in a coma, but her mother, Cari Shaw, told this news organization that she retained the capacity to respond to her. On April 19, while in hospice care, Shaw died.
Over the years, organizations set up in Shaw's name to raise funds for her extensive care needs — Shea's Hope Foundation and Angels for Shea — shared news about her, commemorating her birthdays and posting photos of her on social media. In 2013, Shea Shaw attended her year class's graduation ceremony.
“There was a lot of love around me, a lot of great family, just a lot of love and kindness,” Cari Shaw said.
Life after the collision was hard, she added, but said her daughter was able to “flourish” as they sought to continue their lives, which included travel and a move to Hawaii during the pandemic.
“She fought like a little warrior, gave her everything she could, she was spectacular,” Cari Shaw said. “It was hard, but it was my daughter.”
She said that when the family returned to the Bay Area in January, her daughter's health started to decline.
“She stayed healthy until she wasn't,” Cari Shaw said. “It was remarkable to
Shea Olivia Shaw died from her injuries after a driver hit her 11 years ago. Shaw was 15 years old when she was hit. see her flourish with a traumatic brain injury and take her last breath in my arms.”
Cari Shaw still has strong words for the driver who hit her daughter, but said she spent most of the past decade thinking about Shea.
“He or she is still out there. My daughter is dead, and (the driver) just left her, had no grace,” she said. “I just focused on the love I could give to her.”
San Jose police are investigating Shaw's death as the 28th roadway death of 2022 — a total that grew to 29 after a North San Jose collision early Friday — and the case becomes the 16th pedestrian fatality of the year.
This year is on pace to become the deadliest on city roadways, with a trajectory well above the 25-year peak of 60 deaths reached last year and in 2015 and 2019. The 2011 collision also marks the city's eighth fatal hit-and-run case of 2022, according to data compiled by this news organization.
Anyone with information about the Jan. 8, 2011, collision can contact SJPD traffic Detective Rachel Bowen at 408-277-4654 or by email at 4461@sanjoseca.gov, or leave a tip with Silicon Valley Crime Stoppers at 408947-7867 or at svcrimestoppers.org.