HIALEAH, Fla. – Hialeah police have arrested a driver who struck and killed two pedestrians who were crossing a street Sunday night, authorities confirmed Monday.
The hit-and-run crash was reported around 7 p.m. in the area of East Eighth Avenue and 47th Street.
Local 10′s Hannah Yechivi spoke to family members and neighbors Monday of the elderly couple who were killed.
They said the couple was just going down the street to a convenience store to buy a Lottery ticket, but never made it home.
6 p.m. report.
With tears in his eyes, Jorge Luis Alonso said his in-laws -- 87-year-old Julio Hernandez and 84-year-old Manuela Hernandez -- were hit and killed by an SUV as they crossed the street.
“They were one,” he said in Spanish. “He lived for her and she lived for him.”
Neighbors say the couple came to Florida from Cuba decades ago and had been married for more than 50 years. They are also heartbroken.
“They were the best neighbors I’ve had in my life,” Osvaldo Zayas Alfonso said in Spanish.
According to authorities, the suspect was driving a black Mercedes-Benz SUV when she hit and killed the victims, never stopping to help them.
Police identified her Monday morning as 47-year-old Susej Calcines.
They said she was arrested Monday morning after she and the SUV were located at the apartment complex where she lives in the 4300 block of Northwest 10th Street.
According to her arrest report, Calcines claimed she suffers from some kind of illness and had no recollection of the crash.
Calcines appeared in Miami-Dade bond court on Tuesday morning, requiring a Spanish interpreter.
She faces two counts of vehicular homicide, with a bond set at $1 per count while the state continues its investigation. She also faces two counts of leaving the scene of a crash, with bond set at $15,000 per count.
The judge ordered Calcines to be placed on house arrest with GPS monitoring, prohibited her from driving, and imposed a curfew from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m.
Local 10 News reporter Janine Stanwood contributed to this story.