Maricruz Dominguez, left, and Maria Dominguez visit a memorial marking the spot where 31-year-old police officer Bianca Quintana, their sister and daughter, respectively, was hit and killed by a car Aug. 14 while walking on South Coors Boulevard near her mother’s house in Bernalillo County, N.M. Pedestrians die at the highest rates in Western and Southern rural areas and small cities. Tim Henderson/Stateline
BERNALILLO COUNTY, N.M. — Bianca Quintana was just taking a walk in the early morning dark near her mother’s house on South Coors Boulevard. There, the city streets of Albuquerque give way to feed stores and irrigation ditches, and the sounds of chickens and crickets mingle with high-speed traffic noise.
Quintana, a 31-year-old mother of two, liked to walk to stay in shape for softball, her passion, and for her job as an Albuquerque police officer.
On Aug. 14, her mother found her lifeless body and the bright, police-issued flashlight she used for work, set to flashing to draw attention. Quintana might have tried to cross the highway, possibly to avoid weeds or a snake in her path, her mother and sister think, when a hit-and-run driver took her life. There are no sidewalks or streetlights nearby and the “boulevard” is really a four-lane highway with 55 mph speed limits and cars often going much faster. Police are still looking for the driver.