One Long Beach family is starting from scratch after their art gallery and home was destroyed by a suspected drunk driver on Feb. 24.
Two vehicles came barreling through the floor to ceiling windows of Open Gallery in the early hours of Saturday morning, Feb. 24, narrowly missing parents Liz Garibaldi and Artos Saucedo, as well as their son.
“We just have a bunch of scrapes and bruises,” Saucedo told the Signal Tribune. “We’re all in complete shock and we’re also devastated.”
Police arrested the driver of one of the vehicles, 32-year-old Luis Medinas Amador of Long Beach, on suspicion of drunk driving. His bail was set at $100,000.
The Signal Tribune attempted to find more information about Amador’s current location and future court appearances through the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department online Inmate Information Center, however searching Amador’s name yielded no results. The Signal Tribune was told by the Long Beach Police Department to reach out to the LA County Sheriff’s Department for more information.
The Signal Tribune contacted the LA County Sheriff’s Department for more information on March 5 and was told to ask the Long Beach Police Department.
The family founded Open Gallery in 2019 in order “to bring a thriving art scene to Long Beach as a whole, as well as to local artists and creatives,” Saucedo said.
Saucedo said that around 20 artists had their work damaged or destroyed in the crash. As of Monday, Feb. 26 Saucedo said contractors were still assessing the damage to the building, and that the family isn’t sure if they’ll be able to rebuild at that location or have to move. The family was renting all three units in the building.
“It took us five years to get here,” Saucedo said. “How do we come back from losing five years of work and efforts?”
A GoFundMe campaign has been started to aid the family, and as of March 5 it has raised $40,945 of its $150,000 goal.
On the GoFundMe campaign webpage, the family wrote that their insurance provider recently stopped providing coverage in California, and that the family was uninsured at the time of the crash.
