The senior driver who lost control of his vehicle in a horrific crash Queens on Tuesday that killed him and two other men had suffered a stroke weeks earlier, and never should have been on the road, sources familiar with the case told amNewYork.
According to law enforcement sources, the still unidentified 84-year-old driver had just suffered a stroke two weeks prior and had been advised by his physician not to drive.
Nevertheless, police reported, the senior driver was behind the wheel of a 2010 Toyota Corolla traveling northbound on 19th Avenue and 42nd Street in Astoria on the morning of Aug. 12 when he suffered an apparent medical emergency.
While the exact nature of the medical episode remains unclear, the victim lost control, causing his car to careen at a high speed into a nearby food truck, ramming into two men in the process who were waiting there.
Police say 41-year-old Joaquin Venancio-Mendez and 70-year-old Santiago Baires were killed in the collision.
The Toyota also bounced back and smashed into a Volvo sedan as the 42-year-old driver of that vehicle was making a U-turn. He was not harmed.
The hellish carnage left eyewitnesses shaken. Blood spatter, human flesh, and body parts, including a human foot, were left strewn amidst chunks of metal and food from the cart.
“I have never seen anything like this,” one man said with his head in his hands.
Another man told amNewYork in the aftermath that he was inches away from death.
“I was behind the cart with two gentlemen, and all of a sudden, we heard loud screeching tires and a loud engine roar. Someone screamed in shock, like ‘oh my god,’ and I just immediately stepped back without even looking, and a millisecond later, the car mauled the gentleman next to me. The other gentleman ended up going into the car,” GianCarlo Caruso said. “I’d seen his brother screaming and trying to pull the door open. So, I just ran over to the door. I broke the door off, and people kept screaming, ‘Call 911!’”
The NYPD Collision Investigation Squad is still examining the case.
