WHY WE FIGHT

Remember, if you’re not with us you’re with the terrorists. From the Newark Star-Ledger, May 21:

Family waits for answers in hit-run
Memorial grows for siblings killed in Roselle

By yesterday afternoon, the curbside memorial along St. Georges Avenue had grown thick with dozens of stuffed animals, fresh red roses, flickering candles and silvery balloons twisting in the wind.

The makeshift shrine stands where a hit-and-run driver killed two children Thursday night at the Roselle-Linden border as they crossed the four-lane highway with their mother.

As authorities continue searching for the driver, the family of the 2-year-old boy and 5-year-old girl waits for answers.

“We haven’t heard anything yet,” the children’s aunt, Laila Linares, 22, said yesterday. “I hope they find this guy. How does he sleep at night? How can he look in the mirror?”

Hector and Vanessa Montez stepped into St. Georges Avenue, also known as state Route 27, at 9:10 p.m. Thursday with their mother, Florinda Linares, en route to a nearby Laundromat. Linares, 27, cradled Hector on her left hip and Vanessa held her mother’s right hand.

One driver slowed and waved the family across. But a second westbound driver — in what witnesses described as a large, white vehicle — rammed into the family, killing the children and injuring their mother.

“We are again requesting that people contact us if they have any information,” Theodore Romankow, the Union County prosecutor, said yesterday.

Investigators are searching for a vehicle with right front-end damage and are contacting body shops and hospitals for leads, Romankow said.

Authorities are offering a $5,000 reward. Anyone with information is asked to call (908) 245-2000.

Florinda Linares sat yesterday in the arms of relatives at her sister’s apartment in Linden. Her eyes were red and wet, and she remained too stunned to comment, they said.

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