Boy, 5, Killed, Brother Hurt in Traffic on Halloween : Accident: A group of Vietnamese children in costumes tried to cross busy Cerritos Avenue in Stanton during trick-or-treating.

A 5-year-old boy who was out trick-or-treating Wednesday night with a group of children was struck by a car and killed, and his brother was critically injured by another car as they attempted to run across a busy thoroughfare, sheriff’s deputies said.

Hoang Minh Le and his older brother, Thanh Minh Le, 7, were part of a group of five to six children that was trying to cross Cerritos Avenue, when the two brothers were struck, said Lt. Richard J. Olson.

The accident occurred about 6 p.m. in the 7100 block of Cerritos, about 150 yards east of Knott Avenue.

“They were on the south side of Cerritos when they all decided to cross the street,” Olson said. “They were almost to the center of the street when they decided they couldn’t make it to the other side, so they all turned and ran back.”

Witnesses said that the children were dressed in dark clothing. It was not clear if they were under adult supervision, but paramedics who were first to arrive at the scene found no adults or parents with the group.

The younger boy was struck by a Volkswagen, Olson said. He was transported by ambulance to Anaheim General Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

His brother, who was hit by an Oldsmobile sedan, was treated at the scene by paramedics and then taken to UCI Medical Center in Orange, where he was listed in critical condition.

Neither driver was held or cited, Olson said.

Sheriff’s deputies were initially hampered in their investigation because the other children who were part of the group left the scene of the accident, Olson said.

The group, made up of Vietnamese children who had gotten together in costumes to enjoy Halloween, also spoke little English, Olson said.

Jennifer Garcia, 14, said she was walking along Cerritos just as it got dark, when she saw the group of trick-or-treaters on the north side of the street. She said there were five or six children in the group, all dressed in dark costumes. “I said to my friend, ‘Look. Look at those little kids walking.’ ”

The girl then saw them run across the street, heard the screech of a car braking and saw a Volkswagen hit two boys, she said. The impact sent one boy sliding along the street for about 50 feet while the other was thrown onto an Oldsmobile and then pinned underneath.

“The first one was all bleeding. I was screaming because I was scared. I never saw anything like this before,” she said.

Charles Stovall ran outside his apartment after he heard the tires screeching.

“I saw the kid lying on the road. I ran up to him and I felt for a pulse and he coughed so I knew he was alive,” he said. “His eyes were open and they looked kind of glassy. Then someone said there was another kid under the car.”

Stovall said he took his shirt off and covered the young boy. As he did so, he shouted to the remainder of the group of children to run and get the boys’ parents and they ran off.

Another resident, Irene Leone, said she heard tires screeching in front of her apartment. She said that when she went outside to look, “I saw the little boy lying out there in the street.”

Leone described Cerritos Avenue, a four-lane thoroughfare, as a “very bad street, very busy,” especially after nightfall.

The drivers of two cars involved in the accident were so distraught that they were not allowed to drive home, said Capt. Dan Young of the Orange County Fire Department.

“We had to secure their cars and call their friends or relatives to come and pick them up because they were in no shape to drive home,” he said.

Deputies were unable to confirm whether an adult had been walking with the children before the accident, Olson said.

“From our interviews, the best that we’ve been able to come up with is that the oldest in the bunch was only 9 years old,” he said.

Paramedics, firefighters and deputies who responded to the scene also were visibly shaken by the tragedy, Young said.

“This was just a tragic thing to happen on Halloween,” he said. “Here they were, a group of kids trick-or-treating with costumes which probably gave them limited vision and they had no parental supervision.