LEE COUNTY, Fla. -- Florida Highway Patrol held a press conference Tuesday morning to address the increasing amount of hit and run crashes happening in Southwest Florida.
Troopers say Lee County ranks eighth in the state with the number of hit and runs that happened in the past year. And a lot of those involve serious injury or death.
Florida Highway Patrol’s Lt. Greg Bueno calls it an epidemic. "In 2018, we had 101,000 traffic crashes that involved a hit and run."
In fact, for three years in a row, the state of Florida is responsible for over 300,000 hit and run crashes.
"Out of the 101,000 hit and run traffic crashes last year, 1,100 of those involved serious bodily injury to a victim. 198 of them involved a death," said Bueno.
One of those deaths was Nikki Black.
"She was going to the dollar store across the street from the house. She never made it." Fighting through her tears, Nikki's mother Nina Vahle says the pain is about more than just losing Nikki. "I know that there's people out there that know what happened, and Nikki was a person. She deserves answers. We deserve answers as a family."
George Smyrnios is a trooper who investigates hit and run crashes like these. "I get assigned to these cases. Many of them cold. 30 days old or longer."
He says they created his position as a hit and run investigator almost three years ago because of how many cases they deal with. "I spend my day searching these people out."
So he can solve crimes like Codie Doolin's who was hit from behind while riding his motorcycle on the interstate last month. “People were whispering, 'he shouldn't be here. He shouldn't be alive.'," says Doolin.
He says it didn't take troopers long to figure out who was responsible. That person is behind bars now, but Codie says that still doesn't change what happened to him. “He hit me and left me for dead, period."
Also Tuesday, Florida Highway Patrol revealed the name of a person of interest in a hit and run crash that killed an Immokalee woman back in November. His name is Apolinar Perez Vasquez. If you know any information about his whereabouts, or any information on any case, you're asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-780-TIPS.
