Fatal hit-and-runs spark calls for action on South L.A. streets

By Stephen Oduntan

Contributing Writer

SOUTH LOS ANGELES — Two fatal hit-and-run collisions involving a teenager and an 83-year-old community elder have prompted renewed calls for accountability and safer streets in South Los Angeles, where advocates are urging residents to help identify fleeing drivers while city officials pursue traffic safety improvements.

Sixteen-year-old Hernan Martinez was crossing 60th Street at 10th Avenue with his mother and younger sister on Sept. 22 when a speeding vehicle struck the two siblings, according to police. Martinez was killed, his sister survived with serious injuries, and the driver fled.

His death prompted Earl Ofari Hutchinson, president of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable, to launch a “Catch the Hit-and-Run Killers” campaign at the intersection where Martinez was killed.

“Somebody always knows something,” Hutchinson said during the Oct. 23 news conference, urging witnesses to come forward with information about drivers who flee fatal collisions.

LAPD identified Raygine Glentasia Evans as the suspected driver in Martinez’s death on Oct. 22. Police confirmed to The Wave that no arrests had been made as of Oct. 28.

Martinez’s death was not the only fatal hit-and-run to shake the community that month.

Eight days later, Akil Saud Batani-Khalfani, 83, known in the community as “Bird,” was struck and killed near Central Avenue and 69th Street.

Batani-Khalfani was crossing Central Avenue when a dark blue, four-door sedan struck him on Sept. 30, according to LAPD. Police said he was outside a marked crosswalk and that the driver fled without stopping.

Paramedics pronounced him dead at the scene.

Mayor Karen Bass announced a reward of up to $50,000 for information about the driver.

“No one deserves to die in this manner and Bird’s tragic death is heartbreaking,” Bass said in a statement.

Batani-Khalfani was a father of 15, grandfather of 43 and longtime community advocate and historian.

Unlike the Martinez investigation, Batani-Khalfani’s case has resulted in an arrest and criminal charges.

LAPD Central Traffic Division detectives arrested John Anthony Cardenas, 29, near his workplace in Carson on Oct. 20. Investigators subsequently searched his residence and impounded a vehicle believed to have been involved in the collision, police said.

His bail was set at $1 million.

Two days later, prosecutors charged Cardenas with murder, vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and felony hit-and-run resulting in death or serious injury, according to published reports citing the criminal complaint.

The different outcomes have sharpened Hutchinson’s call for greater community cooperation in identifying drivers who flee fatal collisions.

“The figure on the apprehension and prosecution of hit-and-run killers is a paltry low number,” Hutchinson said. “The Martinez case where the alleged hit and run driver was identified is the exception.

“That makes it even more important for community residents who have information on hit and run killings to identify and report. Until the community steps up on this the killings will continue.”

Hutchinson also questioned whether the city’s $50,000 reward was sufficient to encourage witnesses to come forward, suggesting officials consider increasing it.

But how frequently fatal hit-and-run cases result in arrests or prosecutions remains unclear.

The Wave requested statistics from LAPD’s South Traffic Division covering fatal pedestrian collisions from 2023 through 2026, including hit-and-run cases, arrests, prosecution referrals and unresolved investigations. The department did not provide those figures by press time.

Without the data, Hutchinson’s assessment of low apprehension and prosecution rates could not be independently verified.

While identifying fleeing drivers remains a priority, the deaths have also renewed scrutiny of what Los Angeles is doing to prevent fatal collisions in the first place.

Following Martinez’s death, community volunteers painted a crosswalk at 60th Street and 10th Avenue amid concerns about speeding and pedestrian safety.

City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson’s office told The Wave that additional visibility improvements were made the week after Martinez was killed, followed by the installation of speed humps along 60th Street during the week of Oct. 15.

“My heart breaks for the family and loved ones of Hernan Martinez Hernandez,” Harris-Dawson said in a statement to The Wave. “No family should ever have to endure the pain of losing a child or a loved one due to reckless driving on our streets.”

The City Council also has approved a broader traffic safety assessment along West 60th Street, from South Van Ness Avenue to Crenshaw Boulevard.

The assessment initially called for a report within 14 days, but the timeline was extended to 60 days. Harris-Dawson’s office said the extension reflected an expanded review of the surrounding neighborhood rather than the intersection alone.

Beyond the immediate improvements, Harris-Dawson has introduced legislation calling for the Los Angeles Department of Transportation to initiate a traffic safety study whenever a person is killed in a traffic collision.

“While our office and the city work to invest in the critical infrastructure and safety measures needed to make our neighborhoods safer, I ask everyone in our community to drive responsibly, slow down, and look out for one another,” Harris-Dawson said.

But traffic safety advocates argue that Los Angeles already has tools available to make its streets safer.

Streets Are For Everyone, a Los Angeles-based advocacy organization, has criticized the city’s failure to meet its Vision Zero goal of eliminating traffic deaths by 2025 and called for more aggressive safety measures.

“The city has tools, it’s just not using them,” SAFE founder and Executive Director Damian Kevitt told the Los Angeles Times in January, referring to traffic safety improvements and enforcement measures that city officials could implement.

Although speed humps and visibility improvements have been installed along 60th Street, it remains unclear what additional changes the broader assessment will produce.

The next test for city officials will be whether those assessments translate into lasting safety improvements before another fatal collision.

Stephen Oduntan is a freelance writer for Wave Newspapers.