EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) — Hanks High School girls basketball player Kristina Butterfield died Saturday night, March 8 from injuries sustained in a motor-vehicle crash that happened six days earlier in Montana.
Butterfield, a junior player on the Hanks girls basketball team, suffered critical injuries in the crash that happened March 2 near Laurel, Montana.
Her family confirmed her death on Sunday morning, saying she died at about 8 p.m. Saturday. She was taken off life support earlier in the day and stayed alive for several more hours, her family said.
The crash also killed her father, David Butterfield, a long-time El Paso area educator who was most recently a P.E. teacher at Cesar Chavez Academy. They were in Montana visiting family over spring break.
“Our dear sweet girl was beyond accomplished and such a tough basketball player,” her mother Jennifer Lakko Butterfield said in a Facebook message sent to KTSM.
Kristina Butterfield was unhooked from life support on Saturday afternoon and was given an honorary Walk of Life on Saturday afternoon at the hospital she was at in Montana in preparation before becoming an organ donor, her mother also said.
Butterfield was 16 when she died and would have turned 17 on March 16, her oldest sister Kayla Butterfield Evans said.
“She always had a smile on her face and was a friend to everyone,” Butterfield Evans said.
Her sister was attending the early college program through Ysleta Independent School District and was nearly 90 percent done with completing an associate’s degree, she said. Kristina Butterfield was also ranked fourth in her class academically, her sister said.
Kristina Butterfield was “so intelligent and driven,” her sister said.
“She was the best aunt to her nieces and nephews,” Butterfield Evans said.
She also enjoyed dancing and wanted to be a mother one day, her sister said.
Kristina Butterfield was also looking forward to going on an overseas mission for her Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints faith, her sister said.
Kristina Butterfield was the second youngest of seven siblings.
The Butterfield family is planning funeral services in Utah, but will make information available on how to watch the services.
A GoFundMe has been set up to help the family. You can access that by clicking here.
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