Fatal U-turn no crime
A LONG ISLAND judge tossed a criminal indictment Wednesday against a limo driver who prosecutors say made a risky U-turn that killed four young women attending a bachelorette party.
Suffolk County Supreme Court Justice Fernando Camacho threw out the indictment of limo driver Carlos Pino, 59, ruling a grand jury presentation left jurors either confused or unwilling to follow the law.
Pino was indicted on criminally negligent homicide charges in the July 19, 2015, crash in Cutchogue. Alleged drunken driver Steven Romeo (photo), 55, was arrested after the accident, but he didn’t face upgraded charges.
“No rational person who has even a modicum of understanding of the law in this area could have believed this was a prosecutable case,” said Pino’s attorney, Leonard Lato.
The limo was carrying eight women who had just left a vineyard as part of a bachelorette party when Pino made a U-turn near Depot Lane in Cutchogue, prosecutors said.
They claim Pino’s sight was blocked, but the limo driver opted to make the Uturn anyway — right into the path of Romeo’s pickup truck.
The crash killed Brittney Schulman, 23, and Lauren Baruch, 24, both of Smithtown; Stephanie Belli, 23, of Kings Park; and Amy Grabina, 23, of Commack.
Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota alleged Pino “failed to take any precaution or any action to make sure he could safely enter the westbound travel lanes.”
Spota vowed to appeal Camacho’s decision.