Woman Who Moved to U.S. with Soccer Star Ex Nearly Killed After Being Dragged 3 Blocks During Alleged Hit-and-Run

Ellie Bentley remains hospitalized with numerous fractures after the Feb. 26 incident

A young woman who moved from the U.K. to St. Louis is still hospitalized weeks after she was dragged by a car for three blocks and suffered serious injury.

Ellie Bentley, 22, first arrived in St. Louis when her ex-boyfriend, Indiana Vassilev, a professional soccer player, moved from English club Aston Villa to MLS club St. Louis City. After returning to England to obtain a work visa, Bentley decided to return stateside to make Missouri her home.

But tragedy struck Bentley on Feb. 25, when she was run over by a car driven by a man who allegedly later fled the scene, a spokesperson for the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department tells PEOPLE. The alleged hit-and-run occurred around the same time as a shooting that occurred in the area but the two incidents are considered separate, police say.

Bentley’s attorney, Ben Tobin, of Pratt & Tobin, tells PEOPLE that Bentley was hiding in front of a vehicle after hearing gunshots when the driver began driving away, dragging her underneath the car, before she emerged in front of a bar in the city’s Grove neighborhood.

“At that time, she was screaming, ‘I'm going to die. I'm going to die. Help me,’” Tobin says. “And the people of the bar came running out to her aid and applied pressure to her arms and legs, and ultimately provided life-saving medical treatment.”

Tobin says Bentley is unable to move her right arm after suffering multiple fractures and ligament tears and can barely move her left hand. She also had a rod put in her left leg, which she can’t move, and she sustained multiple broken bones in her right leg and lost nearly all of her right ear. Worst of all, according to Tobin, was the fracture to her pelvis.

“It looks essentially like somebody took a ball-peen hammer to everything and just crushed it,” Tobin says.

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Bentley was in ICU until Sunday and remains in the hospital.

The alleged driver of the car that struck Bentley, Dionte Taylor, was arrested and charged with leaving the scene of an accident, police say. It is not clear if he has entered a plea.

Bentley faces a long road to recovery and steep medical bills, but a GoFundMe has already raised nearly $35,000. Tobin says his client is thankful for the doctors who have treated her.

“To date, they've been able to save all of her limbs,” he says. “The ability for those limbs to function ever again is greatly in question. But she's forever grateful to them.”

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