MIAMI (WSVN) - Police have confirmed they have questioned a person after officers found and seized a damaged vehicle possibly involved in the fatal hit-and-run of a 16-year-old girl in Miami.
City of Miami Police officers located the vehicle less than a mile away from where Diani Gomez Sanchez was struck.
Gomez Sanchez was reported missing after she went out for a morning jog on Saturday but never returned home. Police found her body near the Pelican Harbor Marina, off the 79th Street Causeway, Sunday night.
“My nephew called me and told me that they found her shoe and her cellphone on the ground, and then, he told me that her body was there,” Gomez Sanchez’s aunt Concepcion Alvarado said through a translator. “What happened was very sad. We don’t know what happened. We don’t know anything about what happened.”
Detectives believe the 16-year-old was jogging on the sidewalk when a gray car veered off the road, hit her and did not stop.
“I feel sorry for the person, for that family,” a neighbor said. “May God be with them.”
Cameras captured investigators focusing their attention on a gray or silver sedan. Aerial footage showed the sedan has damage on its right-front fender and a cracked windshield.
“It’s kind of dangerous parked there with a flat tire and a hit on the right-hand side from the front to about the back door,” a neighbor said. “First of all, you don’t hit someone and then walk away. Stay there. That’s number one. I saw it, and that was it. Thought they had an accident. That’s all I thought about. I didn’t think nothing else.”
Investigators confirmed detectives are examining a vehicle of interest regarding an active case, but they did not elaborate. Late Tuesday, investigators said someone with ties to the car agreed to talk with detectives.
“No cops come to see a car cause it was in an accident,” one neighbor said. “It had to be a hit and run.”
Detectives were waiting for a search warrant to get into the car, 7News has learned, and they are waiting for lab results to come back from evidence they collected.
Police have been searching for a gray car that should have significant passenger-side windshield damage that is believed to be involved in the Gomez Sanchez hit-and-run investigation.
Officers blocked off a portion of Bayshore Court while they conduct their investigation, but it has since reopened. Neighbors in the area photographed officers while they investigated.
The vehicle has been towed away from the area.
Gomez Sanchez’s family said off camera they do not want to comment about the latest development.
The driver of the gray car was questioned but has not been arrested.
Detectives returned to the neighborhood on Wednesday to continue their investigation, but no arrests have been made so far.
If you have any information on this fatal hit-and-run, call Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers at 305-471-TIPS. Remember, you can always remain anonymous, and you may be eligible for a reward of up to $5,000.
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