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The mother who died with her 2-year-old son at the San Diego Padres baseball park has been identified as Raquel Wilkins, 40 – who indicated on her Facebook page that she got engaged the same day. .
Thousands of fans were flocking to Petco Park for Saturday afternoon’s game when Wilkins and his child – identified as Denzel Browning-Wilkins – fell from the stadium dining hall around 3:50 p.m., police said.
“The deaths of the victims seemed suspicious and, out of caution, the San Diego Police Homicide Unit was called to the scene,” Lt. Andra Brown told KUSI on Wednesday afternoon.
“The investigation is ongoing and detectives are still interviewing witnesses and trying to find evidence,” she said.
“How and why this happened are questions on the minds of many, especially investigators looking for answers in this heart-wrenching case,” Brown said, adding that detectives had interviewed numerous witnesses.
Witnesses told multiple media outlets that the mother climbed onto a picnic bench, fell, then climbed back up with her boy before falling back – this time on the railing until they died.
One person told Fox 5 San Diego that the woman seemed to lose her balance while laughing.
She “began to jump on the bench of the table closest to the railing, holding the baby in her arms,” the witness said at the outlet. “She lost her balance and fell off the bench. I remarked to my son, ‘Oh my god, she almost fell.’ “
Wilkins described herself on Facebook as a regional manager for the California Virtual Academies, nine K-12 virtual schools. She also enrolled as a fiancee and former chemistry teacher at Durant High School.
Her father, Donald Wilkins, told News 8 that she sent him photos on Saturday showing her and her son smiling and happy in Petco Park – and said he had no reason to believe that she would kill herself.
He added that his daughter would never have hurt her son, saying, “She was really in love with him – he was her life.”
Brown said the child’s father was also at Petco Park when the incident happened before the Padres were ready to play against the Atlanta Braves.
“We feel horrible for the families. Our thoughts are obviously with the family members but also with the people here who could potentially be traumatized by this, who saw this, ”Brown told News 8.
“We are talking to the father of the child. They were not married, but we have the father of the child and we are talking with him, ”she said.
“The San Diego police officers who arrived at the scene did a very quick assessment. It was unfortunately very obvious that they had both passed away here. However, they tried resuscitation efforts in case there might still be life. They tried, but it was very obvious that they were dead, ”added Brown.
In a statement, the Padres said, “We are deeply saddened by the loss of life at Petco Park… Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of those involved. We will continue to decline to comment on the nature of the incident as it is an ongoing investigation by the San Diego Police Department. “
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