The speeding Queens pick-up truck driver who fatally struck an 8-year-old boy in front of the victim’s horrified mother has been charged with criminally negligent homicide, police said Thursday.
Jose Barcia, 52, is also charged with failure to yield, failure to exercise due car and driving at an unsafe speed.
Barcia was swerving around another vehicle when he fatally struck Bayron Palomin Arroyo in an East Elmhurst crosswalk about 4:15 p.m. Wednesday, according to police.
He has been charged with aggravated unlicensed operation of a motor vehicle four times in the past, twice in 2009 and twice in 2010, cops said.
Bayron in the crosswalk at 100th St. at 31st Ave. with his mother when he and his 10-year-old brother were struck about 4:15 p.m., NYPD Chief of Transportation Philip Rivera said Wednesday night.
The 52-year-old driver of a Nissan Titan truck was waiting to make a left turn onto 100th St. at a red light, according to the occupants of the car just ahead of the truck.
When the light turned green, Barcia crossed over the double yellow line and around driver Joel Villacis, who was first in line at the light.
“The light turned green [and] he wouldn’t wait,” Villacis, 54, told the Daily News. “He crossed over the yellow line, he turned and hit the people.”
Villacis’ passenger, Tito Ramirez, watched in horror as the crash unfolded.
“He just went over and hit the little boys,” said Ramirez, 69. “The mother was screaming. She went crazy. (Bayron) was on the ground with a lot of blood coming out of his head.”
Rivera said the driver made the turn much “too quickly.”
“I heard the lady screaming,” said Yazmin Ortiz, who lives on the corner. “The younger boy was lying down in the street. He was bleeding from his head, from both ears, all over the street.”
The 38-year-old witness, recognizing the family as neighbors on the block, said she sat the older brother down.
“[The older boy] had been hit and he was in shock,” Ortiz told the Daily News. “I told the mom, ‘It’s OK, it’s OK.’”
Ortiz cradled the older boy as his mother screamed, according to Ramirez.
“He was dead,” he said of the younger boy. “There was nothing we could do. I still remember his glasses lying in the street.”
“It was terrible,” Ramirez added. “Terrible.”
Bayron died at the scene. His brother was taken to New York-Presbyterian Hospital Queens with an injured wrist.
The driver, who lives in Flushing, stayed at the scene and was the first 911 caller, police said.
“Because of this poor decision a family trying to enjoy a beautiful day will never be the same,” Rivera said.
Ortiz recalled watching the boys head to school.
“They were always happy,” she said. “They always said good morning. I’m in shock. My heart hurts for them.”
The intersection has not been the site of a crash in at least the past two years, Rivera added.
“Any intersection can be dangerous when drivers are not paying attention and making turns too quickly,” the chief said.
The pick-up truck is owned by Barcia Services, based in Durham, NC, police said.
