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Dispute Over Parking Spot Ends With Woman in Coma
By
John Del Signore
Published Mar 4, 2011
Modified Mar 4, 2011
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By
John Del Signore
Published Mar 4, 2011
Modified Mar 4, 2011
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A Bronx woman who was standing in a parking space on East 14th Street in order to save the spot for her boyfriend is now in a coma after an argument over parking turned violent. Police tell the Post electrician Oscar Fuller became unhinged last Friday night around 11:40 p.m. when Lana Rosas, a petite 25-year-old, refused to let him park his white minivan in the space. The argument escalated, and Fuller punched Rosas "in the face with so much force that the woman flew off her feet," according to court papers. Now she's got permanent brain damage.
Fuller, a father of two with prior busts for weapons possession and felony assault, allegedly fled the scene, but police got his license plate and tracked him down in Jamaica, Queens on Tuesday. Witnesses picked him out of a lineup, and he's being held at Manhattan Detention Center in lieu of $100,000 bail. Of course, his neighbors and lawyer say he's just a harmless pussycat. "The other day, he helped me fix my lawnmower," 60-year-old Sidney Maloney told the Post (during winter). And Fuller's attorney says, "He is a beautiful father of a 4-year-old son and a 10-year-old daughter. He's a churchgoing man."
The attorney also claims he has surveillance video that shows Rosas throwing the first punch, which bruised his client's face. That accusation outraged Rosas's mother, who asks the Post, "So she was the aggressor? Really? She's 4-foot-11. How is she the aggressor? It doesn't matter what she said to him or what he said back. He hit her twice, and he hit her hard enough to shake her brain and make it blow up."
Limited parking and psycho thugs: a potentially lethal combination. Obviously, this isn't the first time a parking spot dispute has turned violent; in 2009 a parking space standoff ended with an irate car owner driving over his adversary's foot (breaking it in the process). And of course a debate raged this winter over whether it's acceptable to save a parking spot after you've shoveled your car out.
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coma
east 14th street
east village
lana rosas
parking
road rage
John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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