Parents seek answers after hit-and-run driver critically injures teen son in New Jersey
LINDEN, New Jersey (WABC) -- The anguished parents of an 18-year-old from New Jersey, are speaking out after their son was critically injured after being struck by a hit-and-run driver.
Route 1 in Linden is a busy speedway of a road no matter what time of the day or night.
Last week, 18-year-old high school student, Rayan Bien Aima, was hit while crossing it, and nine days later, his parents still don't know if he will live or die.
"We just stay faithful, and see if that can bring him back to us," the student's father Gregory Bien-Aima said.
The 18-year-old was working part-time at Freddy's Restaurant in Linden after school two or three nights a week. He was working on April 25 until almost 11 p.m.
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When he got off work, it was dark and late, so he called his mom to get a ride home.
His mother said she was across the street in the middle of a load of laundry at a laundromat. The teenager told his mom that he would come to her.
Rayan Bien-Aima was hit in the northbound lane by a dark-colored sedan. The driver didn't stop.
"He kept driving," his father said. "He hit my son, not even worrying what condition he was after being hit by the car and he just left the scene."
Police said it is almost certain the driver knew what happened.
"He had to have known," said Sgt. Tim Hubert of the Linden Police Department. "There was a bunch of debris on the roadway, so there was some vehicle damage, so he has to have known that he struck something."
"Anybody that is a human being you should have stayed and make that the person you accidently hit is being taken care of," Gregory Bien-Aima said.
Police are hoping someone who saw the accident that night will call them with a better description of the car or any other information about what happened.
Gregory Bien-Aima said his son's future is still uncertain.
"I talk to him," he said. "I know he's listening but he cannot answer."
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