A 24-year-old Florida woman was arrested last week for a fatal hit-and-run earlier this month in Lakeland.
Aliya Cruz was arrested on Friday and charged with leaving the scene of a crash involving death, the Polk County Sheriff’s Office said.
The sheriff’s office said a 911 caller reported a woman lying in the middle of a street just before 4 a.m. on August 18. First responders found Danielle Stillwell, 27, dead, with “broken vehicle parts indicating a vehicle was involved, although no vehicle was found at the scene.”
The vehicle parts included a front driver’s side fender liner and a piece of the front bumper. The fender liner had a vehicle part number, and investigators quickly learned that it belonged to a 2019 to 2022 Kia Forte.
Then they canvassed the area for surveillance footage. Footage from a nearby gas station “showed a black sedan in the area, first traveling westbound on W. Highland Street, making a right turn onto Wabash, and then making an immediate U-turn. The vehicle then turned right onto W. Highland to continue its original trajectory.
“The vehicle did not remain on scene, nor did the driver render aid or call for help,” the sheriff’s office said.
Deputies began tracking black Kia Fortes registered in Polk County and found one “parked in the driveway of a house on West Highland Street, which was missing a piece of the driver’s side bumper and the front left wheel fender liner.”
When detectives spoke with Cruz, the owner of the car, she told them she’d left home shortly before 4 a.m. that morning, heading for work.
“She told detectives that as she was driving, a truck approached her from the opposite direction with high beam lights on, impairing her vision,” the sheriff’s office said. “The truck turned right, and then she observed a woman lying on the roadway in front of her with her hands over her face.”
Cruz said she swerved to avoid the woman and believed she didn’t hit her but wasn’t sure. She admitted turning right, then making a U-turn and turning back onto West Highland to continue to work because she didn’t want to be late.
Detectives verified Cruz’s arrival at work at a Publix warehouse that morning with security cameras and badge readers. A supervisor said that Cruz told him she had “possibly killed someone” and showed him photos of the damage to her car.
“He advised her to call the police and report it,” the sheriff’s office said. “She made other statements such as, ‘I don’t really want to say anything,’ ‘Well uhm, I know I didn’t hit them,’ ‘I don’t think I hit the person,’ and ‘I know I swerved.’”
Law&Crime said it viewed the surveillance video, and it wasn’t clear if there had been a truck traveling on the route.
“[T]here isn’t anything [on the video] to corroborate her story,” the sheriff’s office told the outlet in an email.
At a second interview with Cruz on Friday, she admitted taking photos of the damage to her car and telling her boss she was worried because she wasn’t sure if she hit the person. She said she asked him what she should do, and he told her that she should have stopped and notified police.
Cruz was released Sunday on a $50,000 bail, jail records show.
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[Featured image: Aliyah Cruz/Polk County Sheriff’s Office]
