Child Struck, Killed By Car While Trying To Get Help For Father In Drunk-Driving Crash

Police say a 7-year-old girl was struck and killed as she tried to get help after her father drunkenly crashed into an abandoned vehicle on an interstate in suburban Detroit. State police spokesman Lt. Mike Shaw says DeSandra Thomas sent text messages to police about her father's crash before she was struck on I-94 near Detroit Metropolitan Airport in Romulus early Sunday. She died instantly.

Shaw says a driver called state police to say she might have hit a pedestrian.

He says DeSandra's father was drunk when he got into his car at around 3:30 a.m. and that his daughter died "because of a decision that an adult made."

The girl's mother, Sandria Burts, hopes DeSandra's father is not charged. She says losing their daughter is "torture enough."

The driver who struck the girl is not expected to be charged, the Detroit Free Pressreports,

"You have a dad that now lost his daughter because of drinking and driving. A mom that lost her daughter. A poor lady that was driving down 94, that will have to live with the fact that she struck a child for the rest of her life," Michigan State Police Lt. Mike Shaw told the Detroit Free Press.

Shaw recounted the incident in a Twitter video.

A GoFundme page has been set up for the girl.