Family outraged over driver who struck girl on bike on Long Island

ByEyewitness News WABC logo
Wednesday, September 30, 2020
Family outraged over driver who struck girl on bike in LI
Stacey Sager reports a Long Island family is outraged that a driver who hit a young girl on a bike, is not facing any charges.

MASTIC BEACH, Long Island (WABC) -- A family is outraged a driver is not facing charges after hitting a little girl riding her bike on Long Island.

It was a terrifying crash that was met with frightening cries from an 8-year-old girl.

Portions of an incident at 7 p.m. on September 20, was captured by a motion-sensitive surveillance camera at a home on Orchid Drive.

The crash happened at the intersection of Orchid Drive and Cedar Road in Mastic Beach.

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In the video, you can see the driver open her door and peak out - but the only other video picked up by the surveillance camera shows the car leaving moments later.

The 8-year-old who was hit is Zhion Brown Parks. Her family wants the driver arrested.

"The tire flew off the bike, that was a hard impact," Parks' aunt Courtney Green said. "As you could hear her crying in the video, for her mother... not one time, Zhion said she was ok ... to that lady, not one time that lady asked my niece nothing, nor spoke to my niece."

While the surveillance video certainly paints a troubling picture of the driver ethically, police say the driver's actions don't appear to rise to the level of a crime.

In a statement, Suffolk Police say, "the operator of the vehicle reported the accident to the police at 7:08 p.m., from another location in close proximity to the accident scene. The operator described the accident, and stated that the bicyclist said she was uninjured and left the scene with another child. A canvas was conducted by the responding officer for the child with negative results. And following an investigation, it was determined the woman reported the incident within the requirements of the law."

While the surveillance video certainly paints a troubling picture of the driver ethically, police say the driver's actions don't appear to rise to the level of a crime.

In a statement, Suffolk Police say, "the operator of the vehicle reported the accident to the police at 7:08 p.m., from another location in close proximity to the accident scene. The operator described the accident, and stated that the bicyclist said she was uninjured and left the scene with another child. A canvas was conducted by the responding officer for the child with negative results. And following an investigation, it was determined the woman reported the incident within the requirements of the law."

Police added that Parks' family didn't report the incident until two days later, but they says there's a reason for that.

"To be honest, we never knew the incident happened until after, that's how traumatized she was," Green said.

They also say Parks has suffered a foot injury and that someone, they don't know who, came back to the yard and removed her bike.

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