Just beyond the eastern edge of New York City, the Northern State Parkway begins its winding way across Long Island. Earlier this week, a 25-year-old woman trying to elude police went in the wrong direction on the highway in an early-morning chase. She slammed her vehicle head-on into a car driven by a 60-year-old man headed home from work.
Both drivers were killed in the violent wrong-way collision near Dix Hills, police said. Officials said they suspect that the woman was driving drunk.
“My dad, after working 12 hours, coming home from work to his family — such a senseless tragedy,” the dead man’s son told a New York City TV station. The man had finished driving a taxi and had parked the yellow vehicle in Floral Park and was headed home to Smithtown when the crash occurred.
“It’s been three days and I wake up every morning and all of a sudden I realize that maybe it’s a dream,” the son said. “Of course it’s not.”
Police said they had followed policy in the chase, trying to apprehend a driver they believed to be intoxicated.
The state says on its DMV website that there were 7,849 alcohol-related crashes in New York State, with 270 involving fatalities and 3,974 that caused personal injuries. Consider that all of that human devastation was completely preventable.
When a drunken driver causes injuries to innocent motorists or the death of a loved one, an experienced Manhattan personal injury lawyer can help you pursue maximum compensation.
