BY GABE HERMAN | An older woman walking in Chelsea was killed on Thurs., Aug. 8, after being hit by a taxi around 1 p.m., according to police.
The 77-year-old victim was identified as Iris Crespo, of 60 Amsterdam Ave., at W. 62nd St. She was trying to cross W. 22nd St. at Eighth Ave., and was within the marked crosswalk, when she was struck by the taxi heading uptown on Eighth Ave. The force of the collision caused Crespo to land underneath a parked car, officials said.
After hitting Crespo, the hack, Daniel Fusaro, 82, a Queens resident, continued driving north before ramming into a parked vehicle, police said.
When officers arrived at the scene, they found Crespo unconscious and unresponsive on the street, with trauma to her head and body. E.M.S. took her to Bellevue Hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
Fusaro reportedly talked to police at the scene, and said he never saw the woman, and that he had the light.
“I don’t know. What can I tell you? I don’t know anything. I don’t know what happened,” Fusaro said. “They told me that I hit a woman. I didn’t see a woman. That’s all.”
Witnesses disputed Fusaro’s account that he had the light, according to WABC-TV.
The cabbie was taken into custody and charged with leaving the scene of an accident, failure to yield to a pedestrian, failure to obey a traffic signal and failure to exercise due care. An investigation into the incident is ongoing by the Police Department’s Collision Investigation Squad.
