Family Of Student Found Dead On Whittier School Talks About Their Loss

WHITTIER (CBSLA.com) —The family of a special-needs student found dead on a Whittier school bus Friday talked about their loss and demanded answers.

Hun Joon Lee, 19, known as Paul to his family, boarded a special-needs school bus on Sept. 11 but never came home.

Lee's parents said a bus driver found him by himself on the bus that afternoon, when temperatures soared beyond 100 degrees.

"From 8:30 to 4 p.m., he was on the bus by himself.  And then they said to me: 'He passed away,'" said Eun Ha Lee, mother.

"Paul was our angel in my family.  He's in the center of our lives.  And then we lost him.  I just can't believe this happened. We don't know how to live without him," she said.

The young man had autism and lacked verbal skills. His family believes he was forgotten on the bus because Lee normally had a teacher's aide, who greeted him at school every morning.

Lee's mother said she has not been able to get an answer about what happened to that teacher's aide, and the school has not returned her calls.

Mrs. Lee believes the bus driver should have noticed her son because she said there were only two other students on the bus that morning.

"The bus was very small.  Not the big bus.  I don't understand how come they couldn't see him in the bus," she said.

The Pupil Transportation Cooperative Bus Company and the Whittier Union High School District released statements saying they are conducting an investigation.

Mrs. Lee said she doesn't want this case to go way quietly. "We have to take care each other even they have a disability or not. It doesn't matter," she said.

An autopsy is planned for Tuesday. The family has started a GoFundMe campaign to help with funeral expenses.

But the family said what they really want is to raise awareness for people with special needs.