The mother of a Uvalde survivor has said that her daughter was hospitalized on the verge of a heart attack after she visited the memorial of a friend who died in last month's shooting.
Eleven-year-old IIliana Treviño lost her best friend, Amerie Jo Garza, in the May 24 attack at Robb Elementary School.
IIliana's mother, Jessica Treviño, told People that 10-year-old Amerie would protect her daughter from bullies at school.
When she visited Amerie's memorial last week, Iliana's heart rate rapidly shot up. She was then rushed to the hospital, where medics told the concerned mom that IIliana was close to having a heart attack. More than a week later, she remains in hospital.
"I think it's just from a broken heart that we need to work on healing," Treviño, 40, told the outlet, adding that IIliana had no previous medical issues before this incident occurred.
"Everything just broke her in half, and she feels the fear of being bullied again," she says.
The fourth grade student survived the rampage after the shooter walked past her classroom. But Amerie was shot dead while trying to dial 911 on her cell phone, Amerie's grandmother, Berlinda Arreola said.
When Illiana learned that her friend was one of the victims, she "just started screaming and crying," Treviño revealed. "I told her, 'I'm sorry, baby. There's just some ugly people in the world.'"
When Treviño took her daughter to leave a teddy bear and flowers at the memorial site for Amerie, her heart rate spiked.
"The hospital told me, 'Your daughter's going into cardiac arrest.' And I said, 'What?'" Treviño recalled. "Her heart [rate] skyrocketed because she couldn't take the trauma ... all the trauma and pain from it."
Illiana is currently at a hospital in San Antonio.
The massacre in the mostly Latino town of Uvalde was the deadliest shooting at a school in the US since 20 children and six adults were shot dead at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, in December 2012.
The 18-year-old gunman, Salvador Ramos, entered Robb Elementary School at around 11:32 AM. He was armed with a handgun and an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle before "horrifically, incomprehensibly" opening fire, Texas Governor Greg Abbott said.
Before the mass shooting, the teen shot his grandmother, Celia "Sally" Martinez Gonzales, and crashed his car near the school. He was eventually shot dead by US Border Patrol agents. Nineteen children and two adults were killed in Ramos' attack on one fourth-grade classroom.
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