Vehicle driven by Boeheim fatally hits man on highway
SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Longtime Syracuse basketball coach Jim Boeheim, driving a sports utility vehicle, fatally struck a man along an interstate late Wednesday night as he tried to avoid hitting the man’s disabled vehicle, police say.
Syracuse police say Jorge Jimenez, 51, was an occupant in a black Dodge Charger with three others when they apparently lost control on a patch of ice and hit a guardrail before midnight Wednesday on I-690 in Syracuse.
Boeheim struck Jimenez with his GMC Acadia while trying to avoid the disabled car, which was resting perpendicular on the darkened highway. The group had been heading toward the median for safety. Jimenez was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Another man in the group suffered minor injuries in the accident, police said.
“I am heartbroken that a member of our community died as the result of last night’s accident,” Boeheim,
74, said in a statement. The Hall of Fame coach said he and wife Juli “extend our deepest sympathies to the Jimenez family.”
He said he would not comment further “out of respect for those involved.”
Police said Boeheim has been cooperating with the investigation. He used his cellphone light to warn other drivers of the disabled car after the accident, police said.
“At this time we have no reason to believe that there are criminal charges that will be coming for anyone,” Syracuse Police Chief Kenton T. Buckner said.
Police said sobriety tests administered to Boeheim and the unidentified driver of the other vehicle did not register any signs of impairment. Onondaga County District Attorney William Fitzpatrick said that he has known Boeheim for 40 years and that the coach does not drink.
No tickets have been issued to Boeheim, and the investigation is continuing.
“This story obviously is newsworthy because of the notoriety of the coach,” Fitzpatrick said. “But this is the loss of a human being. It was an accident in the purest sense of the word.”
Jimenez’s daughter told the Post-standard he was with friends buying cigarettes when he was killed. Yurisandy Jimenez Arrastre described her father — a native of Cuba who lived in the United States for 20 years — as a family man who loved to cook and tell jokes.
“My father was a man who was very sociable, very happy. He loved to help everybody without question,” Arrastre told the newspaper in Spanish. “He loved having friends.”
Syracuse University athletic director John Wildhack said in a statement the university sent its condolences to “all impacted by this tragic accident.”