AN EX-UFC fighter saved three children from a car wreck last week after their dad allegedly drove into a big rig deliberately and killed their mother.
Brendan Schaub, 37, said he was driving home from a restaurant in Encino, Los Angeles, on August 12 when he saw the wreck between an 18-wheeler and a 2003 Lincoln, with a child sitting on the car screaming for help.
The comedian and father-of-two described on his podcast The Fighter and the Kid how he immediately rushed toward the car despite gasoline pouring on the road from the truck.
“I'm running through this … and gas is flowing from the 18-wheeler. God this isn't safe. I have kids, I can't go out like this,” he said.
“I can hear one of the kids yelling that he doesn't want to die,” Schaub added through tears.
“'I tell him, ‘You're not going to die, buddy’.”
The ex-fighter broke down as he explained how he found three children aged under eight trapped inside and the body of their 26-year-old mother, Aimee Garcia, in the passenger seat.
Schaub said at the same time, a shoeless man was fleeing the mangled vehicle and was struck by another car as he ran across the highway.
The man, now identified as 31-year-old Cesar Iban Torres, recovered and tried to escape again before being Tased and arrested by cops.
Schaub said that he and another man broke through a window to pull the children out.
He added that he made sure they didn’t see their mom’s body as they were taken away and he placed a blanket over Garcia's body before returning to his own car to give the cops a statement.
According to TMZ Sport, four kids were in the car when it crashed.
The kids, who ranged in age between 18 months and nine years, suffered only minor injuries and were taken to UCLA’s Ronald Reagan Hospital.
Torres was also not seriously injured.
'DOMESTIC ABUSE VICTIM'
Garcia’s family revealed on a GoFundMe page that she had allegedly been a victim of domestic violence for years.
“She was a loving, caring mother,” it read.
“Unfortunately, she was a victim of domestic violence for many years and yesterday the aggressor fulfilled his objective and entered the freeway the wrong way intentionally killing my niece. Thank God the children are fine but very traumatized.”
Garcia’s brother Juan Zavala also claimed that on the day of the accident, Torres had called him saying he needed to “give his family to God.”
Torres reportedly believed that the government was after him and drove the wrong way down the highway with the intent of killing Garcia and their children.
Zavala told ABC 7 News that Torres made “bizarre and disturbing comments” that day.
“If I go missing, and the boys go missing, you know who did it,” he reportedly told Zavala.
“I'm like, 'What are you talking about?' And he said God talked to him and said he has to give his family to God, and I'm like 'No, what are you talking about? Come back.''
'MOMMY SAVED US'
Zavala claimed he tried to track down his sister and the children but was unable to find them in time.
He also revealed his heartbreak in learning that Garcia had tried to fight off Torres to save her children.
One of her sons reportedly told him: “Mommy saved us.”
“I'm just broken that my nephews are not going to grow up with their mom, and she put the kids over everything. She was all about the kids,” Zavala added.
“Thank God, I'm here as a good uncle and a good older brother. I will take responsibility for my nephews because that's what my sister wanted to do.
“It's sad to know my sister is gone.
“A beautiful soul taken too soon, but I still have four parts of her. I'm gonna make the best of it, and do the best I can.”
Schaub, who retired from UFC in 2015, said he would like to start a fundraiser for Garcia’s four children.
“I keep thinking about the kids. I haven't been able to sleep. I can't sleep,” he said.
Torres has been charged with murder, attempted murder, child abuse, assault with a deadly weapon, and resisting arrest.
He is being held at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in Los Angeles in lieu of $1million bail.
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