A Manhattan judge set $250,000 bail on Monday for the driver who allegedly plowed into four pedestrians and a van driver on the Upper West Side last Friday, killing two of them.
Elvin Suarez, 61, faces charges including aggravated vehicular homicide and manslaughter for the incident. He kept his head down in the courtroom as prosecutors detailed the chaotic crash that killed 46-year-old Jason Negron and 35-year-old Michael Saint-Hilaire near West 109th Street and Amsterdam Avenue on Friday evening. Three other people were hospitalized with serious injuries, and Suarez was arrested at the scene, authorities said.
Judge Juliet Howard listened as prosecutors described surveillance video they said shows Suarez driving faster than other drivers around him, then veering off course and jumping the median that separates the bike lane from the street.
Prosecutors said Suarez struck the pedestrians with his car so hard that they were sent flying through the air and out of the video frame. They said the van he hit slammed into other parked cars and created a pileup.
The police officers who responded to the scene found Suarez lying on the ground next to his damaged Mercedes-Benz SUV and noticed his breath smelled like alcohol, according to the Manhattan district attorney’s office. A breathalyzer test at a local hospital revealed Suarez had a blood alcohol level of .131, one and a half times greater than the legal limit of .08, prosecutors said.
Suarez’s attorney Lawrence Fisher did not comment on the allegation that his client was driving drunk, but said Suarez has a variety of serious medical conditions. Fisher said he wants to look into whether a medical episode could have played a role in the incident.
Fisher said Suarez had brain surgery at the end of January to resolve a brain bleed that had been causing him severe headaches. The attorney also said Suarez has high blood pressure and heart disease and was taking several medications.
The crash occurred while Suarez was on his way home from his longtime job as a porter at a building in Midtown, Fisher added.
“This was not an intentional act. I can't say that enough,” Fisher told the court. “This was, rather, a tragic episode.”
Police said Suarez lives on the Upper West Side, just a few blocks from the crash site. They said Negron and Saint-Hilaire also lived in Upper Manhattan.
Suarez has five children and 11 grandchildren who live on the Upper West Side, Fisher said. Several of them were present in court on Monday, listening to the proceedings through tears. They declined to speak with Gothamist outside the courtroom.
Suarez is due back in court on May 21.
