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Alex Cabrero ReportingThe parents of a boy hit by a car and left on the side of the road are asking the driver responsible to do the right thing and turn themselves in.
The 13-year old is in critical condition. He has face fractures, a leg fracture and plenty of cuts and scrapes to his body, but his head injuries are by far the most serious. His mom and dad told me doctors think he'll make it, but emotionally they say it's hard to believe whoever did this didn't even stop.
Christina Ponder: "I just got a phone call, and the person on the other phone said, ‘Your son was hit by a car.'"
Of all the phone calls Christina Ponder has ever received in her life, the one that came yesterday, she'll never forget.
Christina Ponder: "I don't think I've ever wanted to throw up so bad in my life."
Her 13-year old son, Demitry Ponder, was being rushed to the hospital. The driver who hit him was nowhere to be found.
Dan Ponder, Demitry's Father: "They need to stop at least, and I don't know for what reasons they didn't, but to leave my son out in the street, hurt, and not help, I'm just amazed."
Amazed is a nice way to say what he feels. Shock and anger is another way.
Christina Ponder, Demitry's Mother: "How could you do that? How could you drive away from somebody? And it's somebody's child?"
Ponder was hit while walking to band practice at Matheson Junior High School in Magna Wednesday morning. Other people saw him lying in the road, bleeding from his head and called for help.
Dan Ponder: "He's got severe head trauma going on right now, and they're keeping an eye on his brain, and he's got brain bleeding and swelling."
Christina Ponder "And you look at him now, and you wouldn't even know that it's him. He's gonna have to have surgery to reconstruct his sinuses, to reconstruct his eye socket. We don't know if there will be eye damage."
All these injuries and the person who caused it all knows it.
Dan Ponder: "Just do the right thing and turn yourself in, and, I just don't understand how they can sleep at night."
Salt Lake Sheriff's investigators are still looking for the vehicle but they don't have a great description of it. All they think is that it's a white mini-van.
