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Police And The Bronx DA Can't Yet Comprehend What's Wrong With Killing A 3-Year-Old
By
Nathan Tempey
Published May 18, 2016
Modified May 18, 2016
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By
Nathan Tempey
Published May 18, 2016
Modified May 18, 2016
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On Monday morning, the driver of a late-model Nissan made a left turn onto East 164th Street a block from Yankee Stadium and drove straight into 3-year-old Mariam Dansoko. Paramedics tried to save the little girl, and they drove her to Lincoln Medical Center, but doctors there pronounced her dead.
Two days later, the driver has not been ticketed or charged with a crime, and some in the NYPD seem to be taking pains to let the world know that the toddler was at fault. Police told the Daily News that Dansoko was trailing behind her mother, who was pushing another child in a stroller at the time, by about 12 feet, and that she was crossing against the light. The Bronx District Attorney's Office, too, has taken no action against the driver.
"Our office is investigating the incident with the NYPD Accident Investigation Squad, as we do with any fatality or serious injury when a pedestrian is struck," spokeswoman Patrice O'Shaugnessy said.
Notably, the NYPD renamed the Accident Investigation Squad the Collision Investigation Squad in 2013 to avoid, as then-commissioner Ray Kelly put it, "the inaccurate impression or connotation that there is no fault or liability associated with a specific event."
When I pointed this out to O'Shaugnessy, she wrote back, "Old habits die hard!"
Indeed, police and prosecutors have long been reluctant to bring charges in cases where drivers' reckless actions cost lives. According to a report issued last year by the road-safety group Transportation Alternatives, fewer than 1 percent of the drivers involved in roughly 4,000 hit-and-run crashes in 2015 that resulted in injury or death were charged with a crime. For perspective, this figure is under the regime of Mayor Bill de Blasio, who shortly after taking office announced the beginning of Vision Zero, a traffic safety initiative that he said would include "more consequences for bad behavior that could endanger human life."
In the case of the death of little Mariam Dansoko, whose mother described her as "a smart girl" who "[loved] school," the charge of vehicular manslaughter would be off the table unless the driver was found to be drunk or on drugs. Prosecutors rarely bring regular manslaughter charges against reckless drivers because a conviction requires proving "moral blameworthiness," meaning showing that a driver knew he or she was driving recklessly. Reckless driving, on the other hand, is a misdemeanor that simply consists of "unreasonably [interfering] with the free and proper use of the [road], or unreasonably [endangering]" road users.
New York City's recently-passed Right of Way Law makes it a misdemeanor to fail to yield to a pedestrian in the crosswalk with the right of way, punishable by a fine of up to $250 and 30 days in jail if the dangerous driving results in injury or death.
In a statement, Transportation Alternatives director Paul Steely White condemned the "not-so-subtle" anonymous NYPD victim-blaming, and called for police Commissioner Bill Bratton to charge more drivers under the Right of Way Law.
"Our crosswalks must be safe at all times for New Yorkers of all ages," he said. "The NYPD must show Vision Zero leadership by holding drivers accountable when they fail to yield the right of way."
A police spokeswoman told us that Dansoko crossed against the walk signal, but that it's not clear from the information she has whether or not that means the light was red. If what officers leaked to the News is accurate and Dansoko was crossing against the light, the driver would have been running a red. There is no indication he has been ticketed for that, either.
Tagged
bronx
concourse
crash
Mariam Dansoko
nypd
right of way law
victim blaming
vision zero
yankee stadium
Nathan Tempey
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