A 1-month-old girl was fighting for her life Wednesday after the SUV she was riding in flipped upside down when struck by a hit-and-run Cadillac driver on a Bronx expressway, police said.
The driver of a black Cadillac CTS smashed into a Hyundai SUV on the Bruckner Expressway as both vehicles traveled south underneath the Castle Hill Ave. overpass at 6:40 p.m. Tuesday, witnesses told police.
The 25-year-old woman behind the wheel of the SUV, believed to be the infant’s mother, lost control of the wheel when she was struck, cops said.
The SUV slammed into a jersey barrier and flipped over, coming to rest on its roof underneath the overpass.
The driver of the Cadillac sped off but stopped the car along the expressway a short distance away and abandoned the vehicle. A passenger also ran from the vehicle, cops said.
The two ran off the expressway at the nearest exit.
First responders pulled the infant girl from the Hyundai in respiratory arrest. Paramedics rushed the child to Jacobi Medical Center, where she remained in critical condition Wednesday.
The woman driving the Hyundai was not seriously hurt.
The little victim’s family members poured into Jacobi Medical Center Tuesday night, where they anxiously awaited updates.
“We’re talking to [doctors] upstairs right now,” Nikia McCarter, the child’s aunt, told the Us.Mistertruth. “This is a serious situation involving a newborn. We’re still waiting for more information.”
“We are grieving,” she added.
Cops are still hunting the CTS driver and his passenger..
The Cadillac was not reported stolen but cops are trying to figure out who owns the vehicle and how it ended up in the possession of the driver who abandoned it after the crash, a police source said. The luxury car may have been recently sold but the sale had not been registered, the source said.
Police on Tuesday night employed K9 dogs in their search for the fleeing suspects.