A woman was killed and three other pedestrians were injured in a pair of hit-and-run crashes involving the same car near Disneyland and the Anaheim Convention Center Friday night, Jan. 5, authorities said.
Anaheim police received multiple calls, the first reporting a hit-and-run crash along Harbor Boulevard just south of Katella Avenue in which three pedestrians were hit, and a second on Harbor at Convention Way where the woman was fatally injured, Anaheim Sgt. Jon McClintock told OnSceneTV, a freelance news videographer.
In between, police believe the driver of the car was also involved in a minor crash involving an OCTA bus, McClintock said.
Witnesses told police the car appeared to be a tan or gold Toyota sedan, possibly a Camry or Corolla, McClintock said. A description of the driver was not available.
Whether the pedestrians were in a crosswalk when the collisions occurred was not known.
The woman struck in the final collision was taken to a hospital, where she died, McClintock said.
John Bilyk told OnSceneTV he was in the area playing his guitar when he heard a loud gasp and looked up to see the car drive into a family, striking at least a woman and a child. The driver had made a right turn from eastbound Katella Avenue onto southbound Harbor Boulevard.
He said he ran over to see if they were okay, but couldn’t get to them because there were other people around. He then saw the car, which he said was a gold Toyota Camry, still in the area and ran to it and saw a man wearing a yellow shirt and blue shorts in the driver’s seat.
“I knocked on the window,” Bilyk said. “He said some vulgar language and gave me a hand gesture and I was almost run over.”
The man then backed up into the bus and hit an SUV and a pickup truck before continuing southbound toward Convention Way, Bilyk said.
Bilyk, who told OnSceneTV he has high-functioning autism, said he remembered the make and model of the car because a relative had one when he was a child.
The conditions of the three people struck in the first collision, or whether they were taken to a hospital, were not known.
