Boy, 7, Critical After Being Struck by Hit-Run Driver

A 7-year-old Oxnard boy was in critical condition with a skull fracture Friday after a pickup smashed into him as he rode his bicycle in La Colonia. The truck sped away.

Witnesses told police that the impact threw Gerardo Cazares Rodriguez 47 feet.

“I told the lady to stop,” said 9-year-old Daniel Ayala, Gerardo’s friend. “But she kept on going. She just ran over him.”

Passing motorist Lola Sanchez took the boy to the hospital, police said.

The pickup driver was still at large Friday night, police said.

Gerardo was unconscious and in critical condition at St. John’s Regional Medical Center with a fractured skull and a broken right leg, Oxnard Police Officer Tom Chronister said.

A hospital spokeswoman would say only that the boy was in critical condition.

Gerardo lives near the accident scene with his mother, Maria, a 13-year-old brother and 9-year-old sister, Officer Ernie Orozco said.

Witnesses said the boy was cycling north on Marquita Street toward Colonia Park at about 5:30 p.m. Thursday when he attempted to cross 1st Street.

It was dark and his black bicycle did not have a light, police said.

One witness told police she warned the youth not to go cycling because it was dark, according to an Oxnard Police Department traffic report.

“He thought that his cousin was still in Colonia Park and he wanted to see him,” the witness told police.

Suddenly, as the boy crossed 1st Street, his foot slipped off the pedal, another witness said. “He was unable to gain momentum.”

As he tried to put his foot on the back tire to slow down the bike, a dark blue Ford pickup smashed into him, witnesses told police. The boy was thrown to the pavement amid a clutter of bicycle parts.

“Our witnesses are saying that the driver stopped for about five seconds,” Chronister said. “There is no doubt at all that (the driver) was aware that there was an accident” and that the child had been hit.

Chronister said that as far as police could tell, the driver was not speeding in the 25-m.p.h. zone and might not have been cited if he or she had stopped.

“Speed wasn’t an issue,” he said.

Now, he said, the driver is a hit-and-run fugitive.

Oxnard police were hampered in their investigation because they were not immediately called to the accident scene, officers said. They were notified two hours later by hospital officials.

By that time, “the collision scene had become contaminated” because some of the bicycle parts were moved, and it was difficult to pinpoint where the pickup hit the boy, Chronister said.

In addition, most of the witnesses were children and could not give police an accurate description of the vehicle, he said. Friday night, police still didn’t know whether the driver was a man or woman, although Daniel described the driver as “an American lady.”

Investigators believe the pickup has a black stripe along its side and a camper shell and may have the numbers 691 on its license plate. The truck was manufactured between 1981 and 1986, but witnesses gave different descriptions of the model, police said.

The truck’s grill and a parking light may have been damaged by the impact.

As it turned out, the victim’s cousin, Julian Cazaras, 13, was no longer in the park. He had gone to a friend’s house near the hospital where Gerardo was taken, and he learned details of the accident later from relatives.

“In just two minutes that happened,” Julian said. “I didn’t believe it.”