Family mourns deaths of sisters killed by driver in Atwater. ‘I’m broken inside right now’
A Merced County family is hurting as they grieve the deaths of two sisters who were struck Wednesday morning by the driver of a minivan in Atwater.
Carolyn Rose, 76, and Billie Edwards, 73, both of Atwater, were out for their daily morning walk together just after 9 a.m. when they were killed by a woman driving a minivan near the intersection of East Juniper Avenue and Augusta Lane in Atwater.
Family members say they were told by a witness the woman driving the minivan was talking on her cellphone and didn’t see the two victims.
Meanwhile. Atwater Police Chief Mike Salvador said authorities are investigating the cause of collision and the department won’t have any additional information until their investigation is complete. Police have not confirmed the statement by the witness who allegedly saw the driver on the phone.
“The thought that I can’t see my wife again,” said Bob Edwards, who was married to Billie for 55 years. “I may not even be able to see her (at her funeral) — she’s so badly beat up, they don’t know if it will be a closed casket. I’m a broken man.”
Next month would have been Billie and Bob Edwards’ 56th wedding anniversary.
Family members fought back tears as they gathered Thursday, shared memories and told stories of the two sisters in their family home, which is less than a half-mile from the scene of the tragedy.
They say Carolyn and Billie were the glue that held the family together. “Our family, there’s just a big hole in it right now,” Edwards added.
Officers reported that the collision involved the black Chrysler minivan that struck Carolyn Rose and Billie Edwards, who were on foot.
Police said it appeared the driver was traveling westbound on Juniper Avenue from North Buhach Road at the time of the collision.
For unknown reasons, the driver’s vehicle left the roadway, striking the two sisters and a light pole. The driver of the vehicle stayed at the scene and is cooperating with investigating officers. As of Thursday, police had not released the driver’s name.
“I don’t want them to have died in vain,” said Billie’s daughter Michelle Elissiry, 49. “If anything good could come from this, I want people to realize if you get in the car, put your phone down. You don’t need to be on your phone when you’re driving because you could kill two innocent, beautiful people that are out having a morning walk.”
Worst nightmare
Edwards said he and his wife both have an app called Life360 that allows each of them to track where the other one is throughout the day.
He said he left the app open while he worked at his desk on Wednesday morning when he noticed her icon was frozen on his screen around 9:18 a.m.
“I thought, ‘That’s weird,’” he said. “It stayed there. I thought maybe they ran into some people they knew and were chit-chatting.”
When her icon didn’t move for another 30 minutes he started calling his wife and Carolyn, but got no answer.
He tried calling a few minutes later and left a voicemail, “Look, I’m getting worried. Call me, please.”
At around 10:30 or 10:45 a.m., Edwards saw Billie’s icon move to the firehouse and he knew something wasn’t right so he jumped in his truck and drove down the street.
“I looked down that way and the street was blocked off, I saw fire, police and HAZMAT, and everyone down there, so I just pulled into the gas station over there and ran to the nearest police officer and I told him my wife is missing,” Edwards said.
Shortly after Edwards received the news that his wife and sister-in-law had been killed.
“I’m sitting there watching the hazmat guys cleaning the blood of my wife and sister-in-law off the sidewalk and I’m crying like a damn baby,” he said. “For what it’s worth, those Atwater cops are great. They tried to comfort me. I sat and cried, knowing my wife was gone.”
Edwards says his wife had expressed concerns about the speed of cars traveling on Juniper Avenue on more than one occasion.
“After sharing that concern with me, to have that end her life?” Edwards said.
Sisters were ‘two peas in a pod’
Family members say the two sisters were joined at the hip, always together going on their daily walks, shopping, going to lunch or going to doctor appointments together.
“Carol was my mom’s best friend,” said Billie’s son Rob Edwards. “They did everything together, they were two peas in a pod. Growing up my cousins were my best friends. If I wasn’t home I was there. Carol was like my second mom.”
“That woman yesterday took the two most important women in my life and God definitely gained two beautiful angels.”
Both Bob and Billie grew up in Merced. They were high school sweethearts who moved to the East Coast when Bob joined the Marines. After raising their kids in the Bay Area, Bob and Billie moved to Atwater in 1993.
“She was the sweetest damn woman that you’d ever want to meet, great mother, wife, grandmother,” Bob said. “She loved her kids.”
Carolyn also married her high school sweetheart, Tommy Rose, and was married for 55 years before he passed away four years ago. They had two children and adopted four other kids, who lived with them since they were babies.
“It just feels like a nightmare that we can’t wake up from,” said Carolyn’s daughter Gabby, 27.
“She did anything for anybody,” Gabby added. “Even if she didn’t know them that well she was always there to help people that needed it. She just wanted everybody to be happy.”
Heavy hearts
Elissiry says she loved to go with her mother and Carolyn to country music concerts. The three of them would go shopping on Black Friday every year and had plans to take a trip this summer.
“She was the best mom I could have asked for, if you were sick she’d be there,” Elissiry said. “If you wanted to do something, ‘Yeah, let’s go.’ She was always up for having a good time.”
Elissiry says she keeps waiting for her mom to come around the corner of the hallway in their home.
“It’s hard to grasp that I’m never going to see my mom again, that I’m never going to be able to call her and share with her the ups and downs, because we talked about everything,” Elissiry said. “She was my best friend and I can’t do that anymore.”
The family is going to hold a double funeral for the two sisters at Liberty Fellowship Church at 1900 Shaffer Road in Atwater on Friday, Nov. 18 at a time to be determined.
Billie and Carolyn will be buried next to each other at the Winton Cemetery because the family says that’s what they would have wanted.
Billie is survived by her husband Bob, son Rob and daughter Michelle and grandchildren Melanie, Jeremy, Wyatt, Nicole and Connor.
Both sisters are preceded in death by their older sister Delores and survived by their sister Nancy Journey.
Carolyn is preceded by her husband Tommy and survived by her children Larry, Jeff, Jeremy, Gabby, Angel and Dillon.
This story was originally published November 4, 2022 at 5:28 AM.
