On a bright Saturday morning in central Fresno, a routine day turned into a nightmare when 22‑year‑old Mina Serrano lost her life in a violent DUI crash. The wreck happened around 12:30 a.m. on August 17, 2019, when 34‑year‑old Joshua Parker was driving eastbound on Belmont Avenue near Barton Avenue. He plowed into a parked car, a stack of wooden pallets and a trailer attached to a big rig.
Surveillance footage shows the SUV hurtling past the loading‑zone of a nearby store and narrowly missing a worker before crashing into the trailer. Store manager Claudia Ibanez described hearing a yell of “watch out!” and then seeing the vehicle barrel through the pallets and straight into the trailer. “If it wasn’t for one pallet that was left a little slanted to the side, the vehicle would have taken him as well,” she recalled.
In the wrecked SUV, a two‑year‑old boy was found, covered in glass and in tears. “The baby was covered in glass, crying, and said, ‘the glass broke,’” Ibanez said. At the same time, Mina Serrano was killed instantly when the SUV slammed into the trailer.
Joshua Parker, the driver, managed to exit the vehicle himself, saying his head hurt and that his tire had popped just before the crash. Investigators say Parker was under the influence at the time, and they are looking into whether there was a disturbance in the car moments before the impact.
He was arrested and charged with numerous felonies, including gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated, DUI causing injury or death, child endangerment and driving with a suspended or revoked license. Eventually Parker pleaded guilty to gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Mina’s family, reeling from the loss, described her as having a “beautiful soul” who didn’t deserve this fate. Her mother said: “She just had a beautiful soul … she just didn’t deserve this.” And her two‑year‑old son, who witnessed the crash and the loss of his mother, continues to struggle. “He has nightmares and he goes around telling people, ‘My mom, my mom is dead. My mom is dead.’” his grandmother said.
In the midst of crushed metal, shattered glass and stunned bystanders, the image of that toddler covered in shards – and the empty seat beside him where his mother once sat – remains a painful symbol of the irreversible cost of impaired driving. The community in Fresno continues to feel the reverberations of Mina’s death, a life cut short far too soon.