A 1-year-old girl has died and an adult man was injured after a vehicle struck them inside St. Mary Cemetery in Sacramento on Sunday afternoon, the Sacramento Police Department said. Officers responded just after 4:45 p.m. on November 1 to reports of a vehicle-versus-pedestrian collision in the 6700 block of 21st Avenue, inside the cemetery grounds.

Responding officers found the man and the 1-year-old child at the scene. Both were taken to an area hospital, where the girl died despite lifesaving measures, police said. The man's injuries were described as not life-threatening. Police have not released the names of either victim, and Awaaz Punjab does not name minor victims — only the child's age and city are reported here.

CBS13 reported that the injured man is the girl's father and that the family was at the cemetery during Día de los Muertos observances, when families visit graves with flowers and candles. Sacramento police have not publicly confirmed the relationship in their written statement.

Person of interest detained; DUI question open

A person of interest was detained, according to a written statement provided by Sacramento police public information officer Allison Smith. Detectives were working to determine that person's involvement in the collision and whether driving under the influence was a factor, police said. No arrest or charge had been announced by police as of Monday morning, and the detained person's name has not been released. Any suggestion of impairment remains an open investigative question, not a finding.

Detectives from the department's Major Collision Investigation Unit and crime scene investigators took over the investigation. Police said their work would include canvassing the area, interviewing witnesses and processing the scene — the standard steps used to reconstruct how a vehicle and pedestrians came into contact, in what sequence, and at what speed.

A cemetery full of families on Día de los Muertos

St. Mary Cemetery is one of Sacramento's major Catholic cemeteries. According to the Diocese of Sacramento, it was consecrated in 1929, covers more than 70 acres of developed and undeveloped land at 6509 Fruitridge Road, and is the final resting place for more than 65,000 people. Its gates are open from 7:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. every day — meaning the collision, reported just after 4:45 p.m., happened close to closing time on one of the busiest visiting days of the year.

November 1 and 2 are Día de los Muertos — the Day of the Dead — when families across California, including many in Sacramento's large Latino community, gather at cemeteries to clean and decorate graves with marigolds and candles and to remember relatives who have died. On those evenings cemeteries fill with pedestrians, including small children, moving between graves while cars travel the same internal roads to reach family plots — a mix that demands extremely slow, careful driving inside the grounds.

What happens next

The next steps sit with the Major Collision Investigation Unit: whether the detained person of interest is arrested or released, whether toxicology or other evidence points to impairment, and what the scene reconstruction shows about how the collision happened. Police have given no timeline for those answers. The Sacramento County Coroner's Office would ordinarily confirm a child's identity only after family notification, and the child's name is not being published here in line with minor-safety rules.

For Sacramento families who visit St. Mary and the city's other cemeteries during remembrance days, the case is a painful reminder of how quickly an ordinary family visit can turn tragic — and why drivers inside cemetery grounds, where toddlers walk between headstones and cars share narrow lanes, must crawl at walking pace. Awaaz Punjab will update this story when police release the investigation's findings.