Her Mom Never Came Home from Bingo, Then She Got a Call from a Stranger. There’d Been a Crash — and a Cop Was Involved

A 92-year-old woman on her way home from her weekly bingo night in Orlando was struck by a police cruiser that drove through a red light earlier this month.

The next day, Jan. 19, Milagros Ortiz died at Orlando Regional Medical Center. Now, her three children are demanding the officer who was behind the wheel, and listed as “at fault” in a preliminary crash report, be held accountable.

“He needs to know that because of his carelessness, recklessness, negligence, he took someone that still had maybe four or five years of life in her,” daughter Judy Santiago, 64, tells PEOPLE.

Ortiz wasn’t your typical 92 year old, according to her children.

“She was lively,” says her other daughter Evelyn Alicea, 71. “She was the life of the party.”

She loved music, dancing and jigsaw puzzles, all of which her children believe kept her mind sharp. “She would balance her ledger, adding, subtracting without a calculator,” Alicea adds.

Ortiz would meet each Saturday night with a group of 40 to 50 men and women — whom she affectionately referred to as “la familia binguera,” or the bingo family — to eat and play bingo together.

“She loved going, and she didn’t care if she wasn’t feeling good,” says Alicea, who lived with Ortiz. “Because that’s what would motivate her and build up her spirits, keep her going.”

The siblings say it was in the wake of this tragedy that they fully understood just how tight-knit the group was — and what their mother meant to the other members. “They were all supportive,” Alicea says. “They all were extremely sad that this happened to mom.”

Ortiz was headed home from a bingo night in the early hours of Sunday, Jan. 18, in a Jeep Patriot driven by her neighbor. As the pair headed south on S. Semoran Blvd., the Jeep was struck by a marked police vehicle at 1:48 a.m. local time, according to the Orlando Police Department’s preliminary crash report, which was obtained by PEOPLE.

A witness, whose vehicle was stopped at a red light next to the police vehicle, said the light “was taking a long time to switch” and the emergency lights were activated on the police vehicle before it went through the intersection. However, the report stated, the emergency lights were turned off when the vehicle passed through.

The police vehicle then collided with the Jeep that Ortiz was traveling in, which had a green light.

“Video of the crash corroborated” the witness statement, according to the report, which stated the police vehicle “was at fault for the collision due to failure to yield right of way.”

The driver of the police vehicle is listed in the report as Andrew McKuhen, 28. He did not reply to PEOPLE’s requests for comment.

The Orlando Police Department says it has initiated an internal investigation.

In addition to the preliminary crash investigation that was conducted at the scene, the department tells PEOPLE that a comprehensive traffic homicide investigation is underway.

Alicea says it was not uncommon for her mother to get home late so she would leave a light on for her in the home they shared.

She was just trying to track her mom’s location when she got a call from a stranger. The man told her that her mother had been in a crash and Ortiz says she could hear her mother in the background complaining of chest pains.

“When I got that call and to find out it was a police officer that actually ran a red light, had no lights and sirens, that’s what’s really struck the hardest,” Alicea says. “That’s why this has been so hard. They’re supposed to serve and protect the community.”

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

The sisters rushed to be by their mother’s side at the hospital and were able to speak with her before she underwent surgery. Ortiz fractured multiple vertebrae and also sustained injuries to her ribs, torso and liver as a result of the crash, according to her family.

Ortiz, who was predeceased by her daughter Nancy and husband, Antonio Ortiz, also has a son by the same name who traveled from Ohio to see her last week as soon as he learned she had been injured.

She is also survived by 10 grandchildren; 18 great-grandchildren; two great-great-grandchildren; and a third great-great grandchild, (Alicea’s first great-grandchild), on the way.

“She was going to go with me in March to meet my great-grand and her great-great-grand to welcome her into the world,” Alicea says. “But of course, she didn’t get that chance.”