A grieving mother had a message for the woman accused of running a red light, slamming into a car, and killing her daughter in Vermont Vista.
"You got a person upstairs - you got God - and he knows all about it. He knew about it when it happened and he will not give them rest," Mary Graham, the victim's mother, said.
The woman behind the wheel, Iyerusalem Bihon, 36, was arrested Wednesday after family and friends saw news coverage of the crash and contacted police.
Brenda Joyce Scott, a 64-year-old Carson resident, was killed at 6 p.m. Feb. 24 at 95th and Hoover streets, the Los Angeles Police Department said.
Family members said they are grateful the driver has been arrested, but they want to know why she ran away after crashing into a car while going so fast and with such force that it caused their loved one to die at the scene.
Scott was on her way to visit her mother who was recovering from surgery Friday night. Security camera video shows the suspect's Jeep crashing into Scott's Mercedes with incredible impact.
News coverage led the suspect's family and friends to contact police on Monday to identify the hit-and-run driver, who then turned herself in.
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"No matter what age you are, no matter what your circumstance is, if you do something have pride, self-esteem and morality to do the right thing and to turn yourself in," the victim's niece Rashanda McCruter said.
Bihon faces a felony charge of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence. She does not have a driver's license or insurance and was driving a friend's car at the time of the wreck, police said. She told police she had been drinking before the accident and was going about 70 mph when she raced through a stop sign and struck Scott's car. Police said she is remorseful.
There was another woman in the suspect's car whom witnesses say stayed at the scene for a few minutes but did not offer help and did not identify herself to police.
Detectives want to talk to her and are hoping she will come forward. At this point, detectives are only calling the passenger a person of interest.
