The Garin Family, And Westchester Families, Want To Know Saturday, July 7th - The Westchester Guardian received a call from Mrs. Ramona Ramos, 42, a White Plains mother of three, informing us that she might have information relating to the accidental death of twenty-one–year–old Gabriela Garin at the Mind Scrambler ride at Rye Playland on June 29th.

Guardian Exclusive

Visited at her home, Ramos revealed that she, her husband, and their three children had been at Playland five days prior to the tragic accident. She reported that while she was on the Mind Scrambler ride with her six-year-old daughter, and her eighteen-year-old son, she saw Ms. Garin, (who she recognized from a newspaper photo) dancing to the music standing between the walls of the enclosure, and the operating ride while it was in motion. Ramos said, “I was concerned when we came two inches from her,” holding her hands two inches apart to demonstrate how close to Ms. Garin’s body her seat had come, “three, or four times.” After reading accounts that had claimed that
Garin had been on the ride and had been thrown from it, Mrs. Ramos said she wondered if perhaps she might actually have been “dancing while the ride was in motion, and accidentally gotten too close.”

Last Tuesday evening The Guardian visited the Mind Scrambler at Playland. While photographing the entrance to the ride, a young woman,
about thirty, approached and volunteered that, although she lives in New York City, she had been to the park a few times since it opened for the season, and had ridden the Mind Scrambler twice on the day just prior to the incident. Not wishing to reveal her name, she insisted that
each time she rode she saw Garin “inside the booth until the ride stopped.”

Clearly, two conflicting accounts based upon experiences four days apart do little to establish a pattern. However, had Ms. Garin been in the booth for the entire time the ride was in motion she would not have been struck. There have been a number of theories advanced, since the incident, some suggesting she was on the ride, and thrown from it; others that she was attending to riders in one of the cars as the ride started too quickly; still others indicating that she was standing where she should not have been.

There are no fewer than three governmental investigative agencies attempting to piece together just what might have happened to take a young mother’s life; The Westchester County Department of Public Safety, The New York State Labor Department, and the Federal Occupational Safety Hazard Administration. In addition, insurance investigators, possibly personal injury attorney investigators, and
the County Department of Parks, with oversight and supervisory responsibilities at Playland, are, no doubt, working overtime as well.

The Guardian recognizes, despite Mrs. Ramos’ experience, and account, that speculation as to the circumstances and cause of the accidental death of Gabriela Garin, a White Plains resident, and mother of a two-year-old daughter, is notproductive. However, we also recognize that her family, as well as families from all over Westchester, and beyond, who call Rye Playland home, have a right to know what really happened to Gabriela.