Carnage

UPDATE: Pedestrian Killed by Driver on Busy Brooklyn Street — And Driver is Charged

A Brooklyn woman was struck and killed by a driver early Tuesday morning in a crash at an intersection where snow had still not been properly cleared. (Update: the driver was charged.)

By Dave Colon

2:25 PM EST on February 1, 2022

UPDATE: Pedestrian Killed by Driver on Busy Brooklyn Street — And Driver is Charged

The corner of E. 17th Street and Foster Avenue in East Flatbush still has police tape where a pedestrian was fatally struck on Tuesday morning. Photo: Dave Colon

A Brooklyn woman was struck and killed by a driver early Tuesday morning in a crash at an intersection where snow had still not been properly cleared — and the NYPD said on Wednesday that the driver had been charged.

Police offered only scant information: At around 6:55 a.m., the 64-year-old pedestrian was “in the vicinity” of Foster Avenue and E. 17th Street when the 57-year-old driver of a gray Chevy came “into contact” with the victim, knocking her to the pavement and causing body trauma. The woman was taken to Kings County Hospital, where she died, becoming at least the 12th pedestrian to die so far this year. The driver remained at the scene and was not initially charged (update: but on Wednesday, the NYPD said it had charged Gale Grey-Lawrence of Brooklyn with the minor charges of failure to yield, running a red light and failure to exercise due care).

Neither police nor the Department of Transportation would give Streetsblog key details about the crash, including the direction of the driver or the pedestrian, or which one had the light. The NYPD said the car in question was a sedan, but a video obtained by Streetsblog showed that it was a much larger car, and the driver was clearly culpable.

In the video, the pedestrian (in an off-white winter coat) is seen moving westbound on the north sidewalk of Foster Avenue. When she gets to the intersection of E. 17th Street, she stops for the light and for cars moving north on E. 17th Street. When the light turns green, she slowly makes her way through the narrow cut in the snow, and then is struck by a driver who did not yield. (The video is here. Warning: it is graphic. A still photo is below.)

In another video shared with Streetsblog by a local business owner, the driver of the gray Chevy is seen making an illegal U-turn on Foster Avenue seconds before the crash.

Unfortunately, deaths like these happen far too often when our entire urban landscape is centered around cars, rather than actual people. My whole heart is with the family of the victim. It’s clear we have so much work to do to prevent these senseless pedestrian deaths. https://t.co/INfpI21AQv
— Rita Joseph (@RitaJosephNYC) February 1, 2022

Hours later, police tape at the scene revealed that snow had still not been properly removed from the intersection.

Dave Colon

Dave Colon is a reporter from Long Beach, a barrier island off of the coast of Long Island that you can bike to from the city. It’s a real nice ride. He’s previously been the editor of Brokelyn, a reporter at Gothamist, a freelance reporter and delivered freshly baked bread by bike.

Carnage | DOT | NYPD | Street Safety

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