Man charged in deadly New Orleans crash

NEW ORLEANS — A driver suspected of killing two people and injuring seven others, most of them on bicycles, told New Orleans police after the deadly crash, “I have a drinking problem,” according to a police report.

New Orleans police said Tashonty Toney, 32, was charged with two counts of vehicular homicide and other counts after crashing his car Saturday evening on a busy thoroughfare near the route of one of New Orleans’ largest Mardi Gras parades.

Police spokesman Andy Cunningham said in a statement Sunday morning that authorities were waiting for the results of a blood-alcohol test but that they believed the man was impaired. Nola.com/ The Times-Picayune described a police report that said Toney refused to take a field sobriety test and told officers that he had struggled with alcohol.

“I have a drinking problem,” the police report quoted Toney as saying. “I should have gotten help, I’m going to jail for a DWI.”

Toney’s bail was set at $510,000 by a magistrate commissioner Sunday. Toney did not speak during the hearing and was represented by a public defender, the newspaper said. The public defender’s office in New Orleans did not immediately return a phone message Sunday from The Associated Press.

Cunningham said Toney was the son of a New Orleans police officer. The spokesman promised the department’s investigation will be “open and transparent.” Saturday was Toney’s birthday, police said.

In addition to vehicular homicide, Toney was charged with seven counts of vehicular negligent injury, hit and run, and reckless operation, police said.

The crash happened along a multiple-block stretch of Esplanade Avenue, a leafy street that connects the city’s biggest park with the French Quarter. The scene was close to the route of the Endymion parade, one of New Orleans’ largest Mardi Gras parades, which was held Saturday.

New Orleans Police Chief Shaun Ferguson said at a news conference late Saturday that despite the crash’s proximity to the parade route, “we do not believe at this point in time that this has anything to do with the Endymion parade.”

Police said most of the victims were bicyclists, and photographs of the scene showed mangled bikes along the side of the street.

Ferguson told local media that bystanders in the area were the ones who stopped the driver.

“We were able to apprehend the subject so quickly because citizens stopped this individual, because they thought they were helping someone who had just been involved in a one-car accident,” Ferguson said.

Emergency medical services spokesman Jonathan Fourcade said a man and a woman — both about 30 years old — were killed.