Child dies after being struck in Sunday night hit-and-run
A child is dead after being struck in Windsor Sunday night by a vehicle that did not remain at the scene, and police are asking the involved driver to come forward.
At approximately 8:45 p.m., patrol officers were dispatched to the area of Jefferson Boulevard at Haig Avenue for a report of a collision between a pedestrian and a vehicle, police said in a news release Monday.
A neighbour who was inside her house at the time of the incident, which happened almost directly in front of her home, told the Star she heard a vehicle stop abruptly and a thump.
“Within seconds, I heard women screaming. I put my shoes on and ran out,” said the neighbour, who would only give her first name, Zoe, for privacy reasons. Cars stopped, and people were “frantically doing CPR” on the child while others called 911.
Although it was dark outside, Zoe said she caught a glimpse of the child and felt “right away” it was serious.
Emergency personnel were already on scene tending to the injured child when officers arrived, police said. The child was taken to hospital with life-threatening injuries.
Police contained the scene and launched an investigation. They determined the injured child had been a pedestrian in the area and had been struck by a vehicle, which police believe fled the scene.
The child succumbed to the injuries and was pronounced dead at the hospital, police said.
The suspect vehicle is described as a silver SUV or crossover and is expected to have front-end damage.
Investigators want to identify the involved driver and to locate the involved suspect vehicle. They are also seeking any home or dashcam surveillance video that may have captured the incident. Anyone who lives in the area or was driving in the area around 8:45 p.m. Sunday is asked to review their footage.
Late Monday afternoon, police released a photo of the suspect vehicle passing a building with a security camera elsewhere on Jefferson.
The incident has been classified as a fatal motor vehicle collision investigation. Members of the forensic identification unit and the collision reconstruction unit attended and processed the scene.
Officers interviewed several witnesses in the area and reviewed some surveillance video.
The 2700 block of Jefferson Boulevard was closed to traffic for approximately five hours while police investigated. Along that stretch of the street, tall evergreen trees planted side by side along a median separate a long line of houses and a narrower roadway from two lanes of traffic with a speed limit of 60 kilometres per hour abutting many businesses.
In a post on Facebook Monday, the Autism Ontario Windsor-essex Chapter said their “hearts are shattered” for a family in Windsor's autism community whose seven-year-old boy had died.
Windsor police did not release the gender or age of the child.
Anyone with information is asked to contact Windsor police at 519-255-6700, ext. 4000, Crime Stoppers anonymously at 519-258-8477 (TIPS) or online at catchcrooks.com.