Keyairra Price, 16, was walking with her friend on South Broadway and Valentine Lane in Yonkers Friday night, when she was struck, and thrown several feet on impact.
Price was pronounced dead at the scene of the accident. Her friend was not hit.
Police say the driver fled the scene in a red SUV heading westbound toward Riverdale Avenue.
At around 2:00 a.m., detectives located the vehicle and the owner was placed under arrest.
He has been identified as 53-year old Patrick Waverly of Yonkers.
Waverly has been charged with leaving the scene of an accident and D.W.I.
Meanwhile Price's family is shattered, overcome with grief.
But amid their tears, there are also questions, and anger surrounding her death.
"For a person to just hit her, and keep going? He could have saved her life..just that one stop, like, let me see what happened," said Debbie Degree, a family friend.
Price had been visiting her best friend, Angelique Cogdell, when they decided to walk to the store.
"I couldn't do anything else but scream and cry," said Cogdell.
"It was hard. That's my best friend..my only friend. And she's gone."
Along the busy street where a memorial is now taking shape, residents have long compalined about dangerous conditions.
"Since I moved here, I said we need speed bumps," said area resident Pamela Palmer. "It's ridiculous."
At the Price family's home, there are illustrations by the artistic teen, many combining her love of drawing with her fascination with Barbra Streisand.
"She just turned 16 a month ago," said Keyairra's mother, Omeeka Taylor-Johnson.
"She wanted to be a hair stylist. She drew. She was just a loving person."
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