CREEPY, QUIET KILLER
Held in road slay, he answers questions with vacant stare
The accused cold-blooded killer offered no explanation, no apology, no remorse.
Deranged driver Jason Mendez, charged with running down a pregnant mom and her six kids outside a suburban 7-Eleven, offered little more than a frosty jailhouse stare Friday in an unsettling five-minute sitdown with the Daily News.
Mendez, 35, occasionally squinted menacingly or tilted his head inside the Rockland County Correctional Center. But he ignored most questions, and said nothing about the heinous killing that landed him behind bars.
Mendez is charged with murder in the death of Melissa DeLoatch, 32, who learned she was pregnant just two days before her Wednesday afternoon death beneath the suspect’s luxury car. He has pleaded not guilty.
The suspect was tasered and arrested outside the 7-Eleven in Haverstraw, Rockland County, where police said the road-raging Mendez twice plowed his white Infiniti into DeLoatch, her husband and their half-dozen children.
Witness Allison Rodriguez, 55, recalled the horrifying scene after dad Shawn DeLoatch asked Mendez to stop smoking a cigarette around his kids. Rodriguez was working in a building next door, and ran to the scene after Mendez first appeared to slam his car into the family and the storefront.
“The little girl came out with a Slurpee, and she saw her mom was just laying there,” Rodriguez recounted Friday. “She started screaming. She just screamed.”
Nicolle Randles, 51, recalled the heartbreaking scene after Mendez allegedly plowed into the family, slammed his car into reverse, and then rammed into the victims a second time as they stood on the sidewalk.
“The ambulance, as I got there, was taking little kids out on stretchers,” said Randles, a hairdresser who also worked in an adjoining business. “It was horrible. … It was just emotionally too much to handle, so I can’t imagine the father, who was standing right there.”
Shawn DeLoatch posted a Facebook photo Friday showing he and his late wife sharing a kiss.
None of it appeared to affect Mendez, who shook hands with a visiting reporter Friday morning.
“I haven’t talked to anyone,” he declared before silently taking a seat.
Mendez sported a purplish-red bruise on his right cheekbone, and red marks on both wrists.
“Handcuffs,” he allowed before ending the session.