NORTH MIAMI BEACH, Fla. – A car slammed into a Miami-Dade home early Saturday, trapping a woman inside.
The woman, Philoneme Celestin, 63, was taken to the hospital after being freed from the debris by firefighters.
“When I come back here, I said, ‘Oh, my God my sister,’ and she was still crying, crying, crying,” said Elianne Benoit, the victim’s sister.
Benoit was sleeping in another room of the house, along with her adult daughter, when the car came off the road and into the house.
"She was stuck in there, inside the closet, with all the debris things inside," she said. "Thank God she's alive."
The crash happened just after 3 a.m. near the corner of Northeast 8th Avenue and 160th Terrace in North Miami Beach.
A loud crash was heard around the area and a white Infiniti sedan could be seen lodged into the home.
Investigators said the driver traveled through a stop sign into the front yard and through the wall of a bedroom. Repairs have already been made by family members, who said that they had spent time removing everything from in the bedroom, including the mattress the woman was sleeping on.
Kevin Jean-Louis arrived to the home early Saturday to board up a gaping hole in his aunt’s house.
“You would think that you would be safe in your own room, in your own bed,” Jean-Louis said.
Local 10 News watched as Jean-Louis spoke with North Miami Beach police, who said detectives are now working to locate the driver.
As Celestin now remains in the hospital with severe injuries to her neck and back, relatives had this message for whoever was behind the wheel: “To know that you got somebody in the hospital laying there, they did two surgeries, you have to turn yourself in, man,” Jean-Louis said.
Police said the victim remains in critical condition.