Police say a five-year-old Cleveland girl was killed in a hit-and-run Saturday evening after she ran between two parked cars and into a roadway, according to reports.
Five-year-old Apolina Asumani was struck around 6:30 p.m. Saturday near the 3100 block of West 50th Street, WJW reported. Jennifer Ellis told the outlet that she observed the horrific event.
“The little girl hit the side of the car and then she rolled on the hood. After that, she rolled down, and she kind of just like ran over her and took off and left,” Ellis explained. “It breaks my heart because I saw it, it hurts, like I have my own two-year-old, you know, that’s a lot to take.”
Cleveland police said the child bolted between two parked vehicles and into the street where she was hit before the car fled the scene, WOIO noted.
“The grandmother was watching the young girl, and she’s in a wheelchair, so she was sitting on the porch, she couldn’t run after the girl,” San Pedro Garcia told WJW.
The child was taken to Metro Health, where she died.
An individual, who was a passenger in the vehicle that allegedly fled the scene, had begged the driver to stop, witnesses explained. According to police, the passenger said the driver put a gun to her head and announced she would shoot her if she talked, WJW reported. She returned to the scene and spoke with officers, leading to the arrest of the 17-year-old driver.
The teen appeared in court on an aggravated vehicular homicide charge and additional charges on Monday, where a judge ordered she be held in a juvenile detention center, according to WJW. She reportedly has arrest warrants stemming from three other cases and does not have a driver’s license.
The victim was a refugee from Congo, as are her family. They moved to Cleveland approximately four years ago, and the child’s uncle, Mulumba Barabara, spoke to WJW through Mayele Ngemba, who interpreted.
Barabara said:
As a family, we were very, very angry. As a human being, a normal human being, once you strike somebody, the first thing that you’re supposed to do is stop and see if they’re okay, but for you to do such a thing, you run over them twice and then just keep going. If we were back home, we would have also done something differently, but since we are here, we’ll let the authorities take their control.
Leroy White, who provided authorities with footage of the incident from his RING doorbell camera, said speeding is a significant issue in the area.
“I’m not shocked because I knew it was coming cause they drive up and down this street 45 to 50 miles per hour everyday,” he told WOIO. “The councilman and nobody did anything about it. It was bound to happen.”
On Monday, the Cleveland Police Department announced a nine-year-old boy died at the hospital following a hit-and-run that occurred in the 4100 block of Bohn Road Sunday. Authorities are searching for a dark-colored SUV, and the scene is about five miles from where little Apolina was struck Saturday.
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