OAKLAND PARK, Fla. – A young boy is recovering after being injured by a hit and run driver while on a bike ride with his father in Broward County.
That boy’s family is grateful he wasn’t hurt more severely but want the person behind the wheel to be found and brought to justice.
“The fact that he heard warning and kept going, even had to feel the car lift up, and not stop, that’s what makes me angry,” said Cecilia Forte, the boy’s mother. “And knowing that he’s still out there.”
She told Local 10′s Layron Livingston that when she got the call, “I just thought the worse.”
Her son’s bicycle is bent up and busted.
She says her son and her husband were riding around their Oakland Park neighborhood last Tuesday when a pick-up truck hit her son as they were crossing at 34th Street and 10th Avenue.
Cecilia says husband started chasing that truck, but quickly stopped.
“He heard my son cry out for me. He said that made him snap,” Cecilia said."When he turned back around to go to my son, all the neighbors were out."
One of those neighbors was Cindy O’Gara.
“I heard and ran right to the kid to make sure he was ok,” she said. “I thought he was badly injured by his cries.”
Another neighbor called police, while others tried getting the truck’s tag number.
“He had scraped knees and scraped elbows and he was scared, and he was crying, and his dad was scared,” said O’Gara. “It was scary.”
The boy was banged up, but his injuries were nowhere close to as bad as they could have been.
“We were surprised no broken bones, no fractures,” Cecilia said. “I don’t know, by a greater power, he survived.”
The boy is on crutches for now, but hopes to ride the new bike that Broward Sheriff’s Office deputies dropped off for him on Monday.
His family is hoping someone comes forward. Cecolia even made her own flyer, which included a description of the truck she got from those neighbors and her husband.
It’s believed to be an early 2000s gray Toyota pick-up, with a small brush guard on the front.
Anyone with information is urged to contact Broward Crime Stoppers at 954-493-TIPS.