The suspect in the hit-and-run death of a 2-year-old boy left the country this week, the DeKalb County Police Department said Friday.
Capt. S.R. Fore made that revelation less than 24 hours after police identified 57-year-old Concepcion Cruz as the suspect in the April 5 incident and said Cruz would placed on the no-fly list of people barred from airline travel in the U.S.
Fore said Cruz boarded a flight Tuesday from Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport to his native El Salvador.
Warrants have been issued for Cruz’s arrest on two counts of felony hit-and-run.
DeKalb police are working with federal authorities and El Salvador’s government to “begin the process of locating and extraditing Cruz,” he said.
Caleb Lindsay, 2, and his 4-year-old sister, Meyaria, were standing at the entrance of a Tucker Wal-Mart store Saturday afternoon with their mother, waiting to cross the road when a white pickup truck hit them, police said. They were taken to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta at Scottish Rite, where Caleb died. His sister’s injuries included a broken arm, but she was later released from the hospital. Their mother, Vashti Lindsay of Tucker, was not injured.
A witness told investigators the driver drove onto the curb and struck the children, stopped a few feet away, threw a beer bottle out the window and left, according to the incident report.
Cruz’s truck was found Wednesday in Gwinnett County, DeKalb Police Chief Cedric Alexander said Thursday.
Cruz visited the metro Atlanta area frequently and is thought to have family here, Alexander said.
His family saw him recently before “he went ghost on us,” according to the chief.
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