NEW YORK -- The family of a young woman killed in Queens is struggling to cope with their loss.

She was hit by a pickup truck on a street in Corona, about a block and a half from her East Elmhurst home.

Eighteen-year-old Sara Perez was was walking home from a store where she had just bought a case of canned food for her 10 cats, many of them strays she found. She would nurse, foster and place them in loving homes.

Surveillance video shows her just a block and a half away from her home Thursday evening.

A dark-colored pickup truck reversed off the sidewalk onto busy Northern Boulevard near 107th Street, nearly colliding with a car.

Perez proceeded because the sidewalk was clear, but the truck then accelerated forward and Perez was pinned against the fence of an auto repair shop.

Perez is survived by her dad and three sisters, as well as extended family who grew up with her in the same house, including cousin Consuelo Perez.

"That's the way that we all remember her, a loving and caring sweet girl," she said.

The cousin arrived at the scene of the crash Friday with other relatives who brought a balloon and flowers.

"One of her goals was ... to be a veterinarian," Consuelo Perez said.

"It breaks my heart so badly," said Ingrid Martinez, who runs a deli on Northern Boulevard.

She says she is forever haunted by what she saw near the front of her business.

"When I saw the girl laying down on the ground," she said.

She watched as a bystander yanked the driver out of the truck.

"As soon as I saw him, I knew he was a kid. He was like 16 years old ... I asked him, 'Do you have a license?' and he said no, but I don't know if he has a permit, I'm not sure," she said.

Family members are using the words "erratic" and "reckless" to describe the driving that led up to this tragedy.

"If he didn't have a license, he shouldn't have been driving in the first place. And if he did have a permit, an adult should've been with him," Consuelo Perez said.

Criminal charges were not immediately filed. Witnesses told us the teen driver said he was on an errand to get his father's truck fixed but learned it was too late in the day to get the work done, so he was leaving.

His identity is not being released because he is a minor.

Friends of the Perez family established a GoFundMe page Thursday afternoon to help with funeral costs and other expenses.