Hearing Delayed for Suspect, 72, in Hit-and-Run Case That Injured Boy, 2

Nearly five months after a 2-year-old boy was struck by a VW Passat station wagon, a Superior Court judge Wednesday morning delayed a hearing in the case that would decide whether Charles Herman Hurst should stand trial for felony hit-and-run.

Hurst, 72, was wheeled into Judge John Thompson’s courtroom in El Cajon by a female caregiver.

After a brief conference outside the court, Hurst attorney Russell Robinson and deputy district attorney Jennifer Cullen* agreed on new dates for court appearances.

In court, Thompson asked Hurst if the new dates were acceptable to him. Hurst said they were.

A readiness conference was set for March 2, with a preliminary hearing scheduled for March 14.

Robinson, who said he’s been a criminal defense attorney for 38 years, will face Cullen, who said she has been a lawyer for about a year.

Robinson said the delay came for “a lot of reasons,” including a fall that Hurst took some weeks back, and his need for rehabilitation. Hurst has been living in a convalescent hospital, his lawyer said.

Robinson also said he needed to see more of the physical evidence in the case. 

For her part, Cullen said she hadn’t seen surveillance video of the incident, which police screened for the media Sept. 1, 2011.

Cullen, who worked in the South Bay courthouse before moving in October to El Cajon, declined to disclose the name of the boy who was hit and hospitalized at Rady Children’s Hospital, or even his current condition and whereabouts.  She said that information would come out at trial.

La Mesa police last year credited a parts department worker at an area VW dealership for leading detectives to the suspect in El Cajon—determining what parts were bought to repair a white Volkswagen Passat station wagon that struck the child Aug. 25, 2011.

Hurst pleaded not guilty at his Nov. 9 arraignment. He could face a maximum sentence of three years in prison if convicted, prosecutors have said.

The incident occurred a little before 8 p.m. on a summer Thursday as the boy crossed Fletcher Parkway at Trolley Court, having wandered away from his apartment home in the Buckland Street area.


The driver never slowed as he left the crash scene, surveillance video showed.

Police said the toddler suffered head and spinal injuries when he was struck. 
The boy’s parents were home at the time of the crash, police said, but the toddler slipped out of the house without their knowledge.

*Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story misspelled Cullen’s name.