NYPD: Driver Error Caused Crash That Killed Mike Rogalle
NYPD determined that a driver pinballing down a Manhattan street caused a curb-jump crash that killed a pedestrian, but police and District Attorney Cy Vance filed no charges.
UPS delivery man Mike Rogalle, 58, was working his Financial District route on April 17, 2012, when an SUV driver ran him over on the sidewalk outside 15 Beekman Street. Rogalle was removed from life support days later.
Media reports said there were two adults and two small children in the SUV. The press identified the male adult passenger as an FDNY inspector, and said a woman was driving. The names of the people in the SUV were not reported in the press or disclosed by NYPD.
Last May NYPD rejected a FOIL request for documents pertaining to the crash. Vance’s office, responding to a separate FOIL filing, said it had no record of an investigation.
We appealed the NYPD FOIL denial, and in July the department sent us a one-page report on the crash, embedded below, with the name of the SUV driver and other information redacted.
According to the NYPD report, the driver, traveling westbound on Beekman, “struck the right curb then veered left” to avoid a “parked unoccupied vehicle” before “accelerating and mounting the south sidewalk,” striking Rogalle from behind and pinning him between the SUV and the entrance to 15 Beekman Street.
NYPD concluded that “operator error” caused the crash. According to the police report, the investigation was concluded on June 18, 2015 — more than three years after the crash and a few weeks after the department received the Streetsblog FOIL request.
Vance recently secured a felony indictment against a driver who injured a woman on the sidewalk near where Rogalle was killed.
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