From the time she puts her foot down on the road until the time that bus strikes her is about six seconds,” says an attorney for the family of Jenna Menias

Jenna Menias.Credit :

the Menias Family

For Michael Menias, the morning of Sept. 8 started out just like other day: he dropped off his 6-year-old daughter Jenna at the stop where her school bus would pick her up and take her to Grand Prairie Elementary in Frankfort, Ill.

“I told her, ‘I love you,’ ” Menias tells PEOPLE. “That’s what I tell her every time she leaves me, ‘I love you and I’ll see you later.’ She had that big smile on her face that morning.”

But their family’s life changed forever that afternoon.

Just seconds after Jenna stepped off the bus in order to cross the street to get home, she was fatally struck by the same vehicle.

“We’re all using therapy at this time,” Menias says. “That’s all we can do right now, honestly. Just keep going to the memories that we had with Jenna and hanging onto them, looking at a lot of the videos and the pictures that we had together.”

Now Menias is suing two school districts, alleging wrongful death.

According to the complaint, on Sept. 8, Lincoln-Way Community High School District 210 provided transportation services for Frankfort School District 157-C, which includes Jenna’s school.

Attorney Daniel Kirschner, a partner at Corboy & Demetrio who represents the family, says in the weeks before Jenna’s death, her mom emailed District 157 expressing her concern that the bus route and drop-off procedures — which required Jenna to disembark from the vehicle hundreds of feet from her house — were not safe.

Jenna Menias.the Menias Family

As explained in the complaint, Jenna lived on a dead-end road, which meant that at some point the bus would have to turn around and drive back down the road in the other direction to continue on its regular route.

Their attorney says that Jenna’s regular bus driver was usually accommodating and dropped Jenna off in front of her house if her parents or brother were not present to pick her up from the designated stop — but the complaint alleges that on Sept. 8, Jenna was allowed to get off at the stop unaccompanied by a substitute driver.

According to video recording obtained by the law firm representing Jenna’s family, which Kirschner described to PEOPLE, as Jenna got off the bus that day, she made a wide circle to get around the vehicle’s crossing arm.

“She’s at the tip of the extension of that arm crossing in front of the bus when [the driver] retracts it and starts to move forward,” Kirschner says.

According to Kirschner, the video allegedly showed that the substitute driver was looking at the bus roster and route when the vehicle began to move forward and then proceeded “to run over Jenna.”

“From the time she puts her foot down on the road until the time that bus strikes her is about six seconds,” alleges Kirschner.

Jenna was taken to the hospital where she succumbed to her injuries.

When reached by PEOPLE for comment, spokespersons for both school districts extended their sympathies to Jenna’s loved ones but said they could not provide additional comment due to the pending litigation.Jenna Menias.the Menias Family

“From day one, the goal of the family…is to make sure that this never happens to another family,” Kirschner tells PEOPLE, “to figure out not just the one or two or three or eight reasons of what went wrong and why this happened, but what — and perhaps legislatively — could be in place to ensure that this does not happen again.”

“She was always smiling,” he says. “She had a beautiful way of making people feel welcome. She was never shy to talk to others. She would literally talk to anyone.”

She also loved her dog and her dad says that when she wasn’t at school, the pair were never far apart. “She could talk about Oscar forever,” he adds.Jenna and her favorite dog Oscar.the Menias Family

Jenna would have turned 7 years old on Sept. 25, and the family was planning a birthday celebration for her.

“We always have two different plans,” Menias says. “We were going to take her to the Wolf Lodge over in Gurnee. Then after that, we were going to have a birthday party in our house with her friends.”

As for what he would like people to remember Jenna for, it would be her infectious personality.

“She loved everybody,” Menias says. “She was always happy. She was a beautiful little angel. That’s what I want people to remember.”