Cardinals’ Junior Gets In on the Stop

Pro Bowl player E.J. Junior of the St. Louis Cardinals helped capture the suspect in a hit-and-run accident Saturday that injured a 3-year-old girl.

The victim and her mother were crossing a street in a crosswalk with the green light when a car hit the girl and rolled over her, trapping the victim beneath the vehicle, police said.

The driver reportedly refused to get out of the car and witnesses, including Junior, picked up the car and freed the girl, who escaped serious injury but was hospitalized.

The motorist then drove off but was stopped about a block away. The Cardinal linebacker, in Hawaii for Sunday’s Pro Bowl, and others used their cars to cut off the vehicle’s escape until police arrived.

Officers tried for one-half hour to get the driver out of his car, attempting to jimmy the lock or pry the door open and even deflated the car’s tires to prevent the man from moving it.

The driver finally opened the window for a patrolwoman and was taken into custody. He was later released pending further information, traffic investigators said.