Family, friends mourn two Lynners

LYNN – The 24-year-old West Lynn native and the 60-year-old Kings Lynne resident so often placed others before themselves, said friends and relatives who recalled Sonedis Cabral and Kathleen McPartland, killed Sunday in separate car accidents.?It?s a tragic couple of accidents and a rough start to a week,” said Mayor Judith Flanagan Kennedy.Police said speed may have been a factor in the 5 a.m. crash on O?Callaghan Way that killed Cabral only yards away from his home. O?Callaghan Way resident Valerie Ford?s boyfriend heard “two loud bangs” and the couple ran into the street where it was obvious a car had struck a tree.?The car was in ruins. You could tell it was a devastating accident; you knew it was high impact,” Ford said.McPartland was struck at 5:34 p.m. Sunday by a driver backing out of a parking space as she pushed her niece?s daughter, Ayva, in a stroller near Marshview Park on Boston Street bordering the Saugus River.Accident accounts convinced Stephanie McPartland her aunt died “in an instant.”?In my eyes, she saved my daughter,” she said Monday.Both deaths remain under investigation, said Police Lt. Christopher Kelly. The child suffered a scratched left knee and was treated at Salem Hospital, her mother said, while witnesses said Kathleen McPartland was run over multiple times. No charges have yet been filed.Stephanie McPartland lives across the street from her aunt?s apartment building on top of a hill in the King?s Lynne housing complex. She said her aunt frequently walked the roughly mile-long route from King?s Lynne to Marsh View Park and back to King?s Lynne with Ayva. The walk usually included stops at Spuds Restaurant or Dunkin? Donuts.?There are no words to describe her. She was the most the caring and giving person,” McPartland said.Ford said young people who knew Cabral packed O?Callaghan Way Sunday night to remember the 2007 Classical High School graduate. They tacked his photograph onto a utility pole at the crash site and surrounded the pole with candles and other tributes, including Classical mementoes remembering the friend and loved one they called “Nedy.”Angel Cernuda said his younger brother graduated from North Shore Community College in May with a degree specializing in nursing. Cabral worked at Salem Hospital and wanted to get a better-paying job.?His dream was to buy a house. He was moving forward, doing positive things,” Cernuda said.Salem Hospital nursing manager Kathy Clune said Cabral worked at the hospital since 2009 as a support associate assisting other employees and answering patients? call lights. She wrote a recommendation for him when he applied for a job as a respiratory therapist at Beverly Hospital.?He was always happy, very warm and caring and engaging. The staff and patients really loved him. It?s a giant loss,” Clune said.Cabral?s father is retired Gillette employee Manuel Cabral and his mother?s name is Rosalia.Ford said Cabral was a part of group of West Lynn teenagers who met as children and remained close even though they were finishing school and launching careers.?He was responsible. He was the kind of kid you want the city to be seen as,” she said.Cornelius Oates grew up with Cabral and said his friend had recently set his sights on a job in Beverly. Erika Bettencourt described Cabral as a happy person who “affected a lot of people.”King?s Lynne resident Tatiana Cedano often saw McPartland wheeling her niece?s daughter out of her Magner Road apartment building.?She was awesome with the baby. I always saw her helping out,” Cedano said.Neighbor Ray Smith described McPartland as a quiet woman and recalled how he would joke with her when he saw his neighbor pushing a stroller out of the building?s entrance.?I?d joke, ?You?re taking the queen out again,?” he said.McPartland?s sister, Jean Donnelly, also lived in King?s Lynne and could not muster words Monday to describe her sister except to say Kathleen McPartland was a General Electric retiree.Stephanie McPartland, 26, said