The number of pedestrians killed by hit-and-run drivers in the United States has jumped 20 percent since 2000 and is at its highest level in a decade, a news report said Tuesday.

Of the 4,4881 pedestrians killed last year, 974 died in hit-and- runs, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration records showed, according to the USA Today report.

The total number of pedestrians killed nationwide increased by 2 percent since 2000, but hit-and-run deaths rose at almost 10 times that pace, the report said.

The increase compounded the problems of investigating hit-and- run cases, which investigators said were among the most difficult crimes to solve because they often happened at night with no witnesses, it said.

The last time the country had so many hit-and-run deaths was in 1996, when there were 982, out of 5,400 pedestrians killed that year.

Likely factors for the increase included more cars sharing the road with more pedestrians, and increasingly distracted and aggressive drivers, according to Peter Kissinger, chief executive officer of the American Automobile Association Traffic Safety Foundation.

There were no national tally showing how many hit-and-run cases were solved. In many investigations in which drivers were later found, they told police that they fled out of fear or because they had been drinking and wanted to avoid legal trouble, the report quoted Doug Dodson, a spokesman for the Florida Highway Patrol, as saying.

Source: Xinhuabank.

Source: Xinhua