MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. – A driver has been taken into custody following a deadly hit-and-run crash in Miami Gardens involving two students from Florida Memorial University.
According to authorities, Jerome Harrell, 35, was driving a silver Infiniti traveling southbound on NW 42nd Avenue around 11:30 p.m. Sunday when he struck two women who were walking south in the middle lane.
Local 10 News obtained surveillance video where the women were seen walking in the middle of the street and attempting to cross.
Witnesses told police the driver stopped got out of the car and said, “What just hit me?” before driving away from the scene.
Relatives identified one of the victims as 19-year-old Asiayanna Green.
“She was a good kid. Quiet and humble,” Green’s aunt, Lisa Walker, said. “It’s sad that her life was taken just that quick over nothing and it’s just hard as a family. We’re just receiving the news.”
Randy Meran saw both Green and the other victim just an hour before the crash.
“We were with both of them,” he said, adding they were watching the Super Bowl. “And then things just unraveled.”
Miami Gardens police said they used K-9′s to track Harrell, which led them to the back of a gated home where he was hiding just a few blocks away from the crash.
Authorities told Local 10 News that someone at the home shot Harrell in the stomach after finding him on the property.
County records obtained by Local 10 News show that Harrell has been previously cited 49 times for traffic offenses.
Harrell was treated at a nearby hospital for his gunshot wound but is now facing two charges of leaving the scene of a crash involving a death.
FMU confirmed in an email to students and faculty Monday that the victims were both first-year students at the university.
Police have not yet identified the other victim that was killed in the crash.
No other details about the crash were immediately released.