Boy, 6, dies after being pinned under car in Tioga

THE MEN on 15th Street near Erie Avenue in Tioga yesterday did everything they could to lift the 1979 Buick LeSabre off the little boy's bent, broken body after the car ran over him, pinning him to the street.

One of them, who police said was the Buick's driver, brought out a jack to try to lift the car as the others tried to shift the weight of the massive vehicle off the child.

But it was too late. The boy, 6, was dead under the mud-brown car. Medics pronounced it officially at 4:13 p.m., police said. The driver of the LeSabre, in what investigators said appeared to be a tragic accident, had hit the boy as he walked with his mother. Authorities did not identify him last night.

"The man who was trying to jack the car up said that's something nobody should ever want to see," said Deborah Graves, 51, who lives on the block and watched the horror unfold as her husband joined in trying to free the boy. "His mother, she was trying to get up under that car, and she was telling him to get up."

It all happened in an instant, Graves said. She was inside and heard the commotion about 4 p.m. When she came out, she said, she saw everything: The boy's tiny feet sticking out from under the car in the middle of the street. His mother trying to crawl underneath to retrieve her baby. The men attempting the futile task of lifting the hulking vehicle.

"I just feel for the mother," Graves said in the aftermath. "I called my daughter and told her to give my grandbaby a big hug and a sloppy kiss from me."

Witnesses told police that the man driving the LeSabre was not speeding when he hit the boy. Neighbors said the boy had been walking with his mom and sister on the block when for some reason he darted into the street between parked cars and was run over. The driver - who police said was not under the influence - stopped and tried to help free the boy.

Graves and neighbor Brandy Broadus, 28, said the block is regularly a speedway for motorists coming down from busy Erie Avenue, endangering dozens of kids who play outside - very often in the street, the pair said.

"I can't take it. It gives me anxiety [to watch]," Broadus said.

As she and Graves stood on the porch last night reflecting on the boy's death, the tragic scenario came dangerously close to replaying: A little girl on the block - out of sight of her mother, who had gone inside, and of her distracted siblings - waddled toward the curb as a vehicle approached.

Just as the toddler got within a few feet of the street, the women shouted frantically at her siblings to catch her.

"Nowadays you can't tell your child to go out and play - because if they're not shooting them, they're running them over with cars," Graves lamented.

"Kids today catch hell."