His life had value, though it's unclear if the NYPD agrees.
The police officer who fatally struck a man inside Flushing Meadows Corona Park in broad daylight was not even looking at the road while driving on the usually car-free path, two witnesses said — compounding the pain of a grieving family that says it has been completely left in the dark by the NYPD.
Erasmo Huerta Gonzalez, a 38-year-old Queens resident and father, was lying on the interior United Nations Avenue South park path at around 4:40 p.m. on Aug. 23 when an officer driving an NYPD cruiser rolled over him, according to an initial report from the NYPD.
A bystander, who saw the entire crash, told Streetsblog that the cop was driving slowly, but was not paying attention to the road until the motorist had driven over Gonzalez with the front wheels.
"Both the driver and passenger cops were striking a conversation," one witness, who asked to remain anonymous, told Streetsblog. "They were looking at each other instead [of the road]."
It is unclear why Gonzalez was lying on the usually car-free path; onlookers were shocked when the squad car's driver didn't stop — before or after rolling over the man.
"We had to yell and wave at the cops to stop the car," the bystander told Streetsblog. "You could hear the crunch of what we assumed to be bones. Yeah, it was awful."
The crash is especially egregious given that there was a senior cop standing on the lawn nearby, but that supervising officer didn't warn her colleagues about Gonzalez lying in the road, the witness said.
"She never made any attempt to stop the car or warn [the police officer] that there was someone on the road," the witness said.
It took 20 minutes for paramedics to show up and extract Gonzalez, according to the onlooker. The witness could still see his legs moving under the car and after first responders put him on a stretcher. He died later at New York-Presbyterian Queens Hospital.
Another witness posted a similar crash account in a discussion on Reddit, calling it "100 percent negligence from the NYPD," because the driving cop was not paying attention — and at a crucial time: The death happened as the already busy park was flooded with law enforcement and other motorists ahead of the annual US Open tournament, which takes over large swaths of the green space for two weeks during the prime weather of late summer.
'Salt in the wounds'
The family of Gonzalez, who moved to the United States from Mexico in 2012, did not hear about his death until a week ago on Wednesday, four days after the crash, and not until a friend of his contacted a relative, said his sister-in-law.
"It feels like they didn’t think his life had value and we really want to show that his life had value," Hannah Fleury told Streetsblog. "He was our family and were devastated and want answers and want to show that he wasn’t expendable."
Two of his brothers who also live in New York went to identify him by photos at the local precinct the next day.
Fleury and Gonzalez's large family in the U.S. and Mexico still had little information about their loved one's final moments beyond some cursory news reports, when Streetsblog spoke to her 10 days after the crash.
"We really only know what’s been in the news reports, which we are not happy about," Fleury said. "It does feel like they were hoping no one would identify him."
The silence has frustrated the victim's family, especially given that the NYPD public information office, staffed with more than 40 officers, has been entirely unforthcoming with public information about the crash. The office has not released the victim's identity, which is standard procedure in fatalities (Streetsblog has requested the information five times).
The agency's press office initially said the investigation was "ongoing," then stopped responding to follow-up emails seeking more information about the crash. Streetsblog also asked the NYPD to respond to the witness accounts, to explain whether the NYPD was investigating its officers' actions, and to respond to the family's claims that they had been left in the dark.
"The salt in the wounds is it just feels like they didn’t see him as a person who mattered," said Fleury.
She fondly recalled her husband's brother, who lived with them for years and had tattoos of his 16-year-old son Ulises, who lives in Mexico. He was the youngest of six siblings, three of whom still live in Mexico.
"He loved soccer, he was just always an upbeat person", she said. "As a mother, to explain to my children what happened to their uncle, we’re all trying to make sense of this.
"He meant a lot to everybody."
New York Attorney General Letitia James's office has launched a probe into the case on Aug. 26, triggered by state law covering any instance where a police officer kills someone "by an act or omission."
Tennis takeover
The path where Gonzalez was killed is usually not open to cars, like most of Flushing Meadows Corona Park, except for Meridian Road, which rings the green space that once served as the World's Fair grounds.
But during the two-week US Open, the NYPD sets up a precinct-size operation inside the park's parking areas near the Queens Theatre each year, and officers patrol the interior paths in their cruisers and SUVs, adding a dangerous element to what should be a quiet, contemplative green space.
Advocates have for years slammed the city and tennis officials for taking over swaths of the public lawns and giving it to visitors – many of whom drive in and park on the lawns for the event during the prime late summer weeks.
"It becomes an entirely different place when the US Open is in," said Peter Beadle, a Queens-based safe streets advocate and pedestrian and bike attorney. "This is an environment that otherwise rarely sees motor vehicles. The fact that there’s motor vehicle access to that place other than parks vehicles is a longer overarching problem."
Beadle said the police should rely more on smaller vehicles like golf carts or bikes to deploy around the park paths.
"There needs to be a better match between the job being performed by our police and the space they are operating in," he said. "A vehicle that’s made for city streets is not the best choice for parks streets."
There shouldn't be any cars in the park at all, given it's full of families enjoying the outdoors, said Fleury.
"There’s always a dog running loose, a child, a ball," she said. "Why was NYPD even there in the park that day, what safety did they provide that day?"
The Gonzalez family has set up an online fundraiser to repatriate his body to Mexico.
Update (Wednesday, Sept. 3, 12:34 p.m.): After publication of this story, DCPI responded with an email claiming that Gonzalez's identification was still "being withheld pending proper family notification," despite his brothers already confirming his death a week ago. The police's press office added that the officer was "traveling safely below 10mph," and that paramedics were "called immediately upon incident." The case remains under investigation by its Collision Investigation Squad and Force Investigation Division, the rep added.
