A 40-year-old man is accused of hitting a mother and her 2-year-old son on a busy Pasco street and driving away earlier this month.

Jose I. Perez-Vega of Kennewick allegedly left the woman fighting for her life as he drove home and removed the broken grill from his pickup, court documents said.

Prosecutors have charged Perez Vega with vehicular assault and hit-and-run injury in Franklin County Superior Court. He is being held in the Franklin County jail, with bail set at $250,000.

Investigators say the mother and her son were crossing in a crosswalk on North 22nd Avenue just north of Henry Street about 6:50 p.m. on Oct. 11.

Witnesses said a pickup struck them but didn't stop, court documents state. It continued south on 22nd Avenue, where it turned into a gravel parking lot and then drove through the Albertsons' store parking lot.

The woman was rushed to Kadlec Regional Medical Center in Richland and into surgery for a life-threatening injury to her liver. The boy also was taken to Kadlec for "superficial injuries" throughout his body.

Investigators used video of the truck in the store parking lot to identify it as a dark green truck without a bed. They also discovered broken plastic from the grill on the ground where the truck hit them.

Police were able to use a camera system to identify the truck as Perez Vega's 1998 Ford F-150 on Oct. 12, said court documents.

Officers found the truck parked behind his home on Buchanan Court in Kennewick in a fenced in backyard.

Once they received a search warrant, they reportedly found several pieces of green plastic around the front of the truck, where the grille had been taken off. They also said the gravel where the truck was parked was soaking wet where the truck had been washed, said the documents.

Perez Vega reportedly was the only one who drove the truck.

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