Manslaughter indictment for hit-run driver

By John M. Annese Staten Island Advance

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- A hit-and-run driver accused of mowing down a woman who was fixing her car last year has been indicted on manslaughter charges.

Estik David Lozano, 20, faces second-degree manslaughter and vehicular-manslaughter charges for his alleged role in the July 10, 2010 crash, which killed Brunilda Maldonado, 47, of Mariners Harbor.

Authorities allege that Lozano had downed a quarter-bottle of Scotch before the fatal accident occurred.

Lozano had previously been charged with felony leaving the scene of an accident, which caries a maximum prison sentence of seven years, and driving while intoxicated. He still faces those charges, but the new charges could now mean five and 15 years behind bars if he's convicted at trial.

Authorities said Ms. Maldonado had pulled over on Targee Street near Laurel Avenue after her car had overheated. Another motorist, Daniel Shields, stopped alongside Ms. Maldonado's disabled car to help.

Lozano tried to maneuver between the two cars, hitting Ms. Maldonado as she was leaning under her vehicle's hood, prosecutors allege. He then drove to his home a few blocks away on Targee, prosecutors say.

When police arrested him more than four hours later, his blood alcohol level allegedly measured at .16 percent -- twice the .08 legal threshold for driving while intoxicated.

The indictment lists three separate factors to show Lozano's reckless actions caused her death -- his intoxication, the "high rate of speed" he had reached, and the fact that he tried to drive between a parked car and a disabled vehicle with its hazards blinking, the indictment states.

Those factors, taken together, warrant the second-degree manslaughter charge, said Peter N. Spencer, a spokesman for District Attorney Daniel Donovan.

Lozano admitted to investigators that he'd been drinking Chivas and was hanging out with friends at Von Briesen Park in Fort Wadsworth, and had his 17-year-old sister in the car at the time of the crash, according to a law enforcement source familiar with the case.

Lozano's lawyer, Patrick V. Parrota, said the circumstances of the accident, including where Ms. Maldonado pulled over her vehicle and why, "has some bearing on the level of culpability."

"I think it's very important to examine the physical layout of the accident. She stopped her car in the middle of a busy and dark roadway, even though the evidence suggests she could have pulled over to the side of the street," said Lozano's lawyer, Patrick V. Parrotta. "And because she did this, it unfortunately became very likely that her and her car would be struck be a passing motorist."

Lozano, who was arraigned on the new charges Friday in state Supreme Court in St. George, remains free on $150,000 bail. He's scheduled to return to court June 30.

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