Cops Seek Hit-And-Run Driver Who Injured 4-Year-Old Girl Outside Bronx Playground
Cops are hunting for the driver who hit a 4-year-old girl near a park on Wednesday and fled as she was taken to the hospital with an apparent head injury.
Aicha Camara was hit around 4 p.m. near the Longfellow Playground in the Longwood section of the Bronx, her sister and police said. In addition to the unspecified head wound, the driver also shattered her right leg, cops said.
A witness said the driver of the gray Jeep never slowed after the crash, which was on Longfellow between E. 165th and E. 167th streets.
“A little girl was crossing the street and a car came fast and kept going,” said the witness Jason Coronado. “I feel so bad for that little girl, it made me cry.”
The victim’s sister, Mmahawa Traore, 22, said the family moved to the South Bronx from Tennessee two years ago. Right now, she said the family is focused on the child’s recovery and the police effort to find the driver.
“It makes me mad because you just hit an innocent child and you did not stop to at least see what happened instead of just driving away,” said the sister. “You never know when it’ll be happening to your family or you.”
Another resident of the area said drivers speed on the narrow road.
“Cars run through here like it’s the highway,” said Maria Canela, who called for more enforcement against reckless drivers. “The cops said they can’t do nothing about it.”
In 2011, the Department of Transportation put in “Slow Zone” signs on concrete blocks in marked boxes in the roadway on Longfellow Avenue. But four years later, Streetsblog caught DOT moving the signs further from the roadway onto the sidewalk.
“They should have more stop signs because there’s not even a stop sign at the street where it happened,” Traore said.
Her sister is expected home from Harlem Hospital tomorrow.
“We’re going to move away,” said Traore, “to somewhere safer, streetwise.”
The NYPD is urging anyone with information about the crash to call 800-577-8477 (or, in Spanish, 888-577-4782). The public can also submit tips at the Crime Stoppers website, or on X @NYPDTips.
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