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7-year-old killed in Polk rollover accident

Posted at 5:43 PM, Apr 12, 2016
and last updated 2016-04-13 00:31:46-04

Investigators are trying to determine how a driver lost control of his car Monday night near Lake Wales, rolling it over and killing a 7-year-old child in the backseat.

The child was not wearing a seatbelt at the time and got ejected from the car.

Shards of glass and small pieces of the totaled SUV are all that remain at the spot on the side of State Road 60 in Alturas, west of Lake Wales.

"There are a lot of factors that we are going to be looking at, obviously distracted driving and whether speed was a factor is all under investigation," said Donna Wood, a Polk County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman.

Wood said there weren't witnesses to the crash, but several people stopped when they saw flames coming from the ditch, including passing truck driver Mike Seesz of Port St. Lucie.

"By the time I realized what I had actually just seen, I went and did a U-turn," he said.

He ran back to his truck to grab a fire extinguisher and quickly put out the fire.

"I got a lot of it out but there was just a little flicker left. And that's when I heard the screaming coming from inside the car," he recalls.

He said it was an adult man screaming for help, unable to get his front female passenger freed from the seatbelt and mangled metal.

Seesz tells ABC Action News that another passerby stopped and was tending to the child, Kamicheliz Ayala, 7, who was tossed form the car.

The men managed to free the passenger right before the fire started up again.

"It kind of gets crazy in a situation like that," he said. "The thinking just kind of goes out and you just act."

The driver, Harry Figueroa-Vazquez, 42, is in stable condition.

His friend, Olmary Liz Gonzalez-Bonew, a passenger in the vehicle, is in critical condition. The 7-year-old killed in the crash was her daughter.