A hit-and-run driver killed a 55-year-old man crossing a Brooklyn street early Saturday, police said.
It was one of two fatal crashes to take place Saturday morning in the five boroughs, police said.
The victim was crossing Washington Ave. at Fulton St. in Clinton Hill about 12:20 a.m. when a burgundy-colored Ford Explorer heading west on Fulton St. rammed into him, cops said.
The Ford Explorer’s driver sped off without stopping, stunned witnesses told police.
EMS rushed the victim to New York Presbyterian-Brooklyn Methodist Hospital, but he couldn’t be saved. The man’s name was not immediately released as cops first worked to track down family members.
In video reviewed by the Daily News, the man can be seen limping slowly across the street. He almost reaches the other side when what appears to be a burgundy SUV traveling at a high speed relative to other cars plows into him without stopping, sweeping the man forward so suddenly, it looks like he disappears from the frame.
A deli clerk who didn’t want to be identified said the victim went by the nickname “Bus” because he was always sitting at a nearby bus stop bench. “He was harmless,” the clerk said.
Another clerk at a different nearby deli said he saw the man yesterday speaking with a friend.
“It’s kind of sad. I mean, whatever, if the light was red or green, he doesn’t look like he wants to stop,” he said of the driver. “I’ve seen him before. I seen him yesterday,” he said of the hit-and-run victim. “He was hanging out with his friend. They were talking.
“It’s very sad,” he said.
No arrests have been made.
In an unrelated incident, about an hour after the Clinton Hill crash, a 22-year-old driver died when his Infiniti G37 veered into oncoming traffic and slammed into a parked city sanitation truck in Queens, cops said.
The motorist was heading north on Douglaston Parkway outside Alley Pond Park in Bayside around 1:45 a.m. when he veered into the southbound lane — straight into the front end of an unoccupied city sanitation truck outside the city Department of Sanitation’s Queens garage.
He died at the scene. His name was not immediately released.
No other cars were involved in the crash, cops said.
Saturday’s crash in Brooklyn was the second fatal hit-and-run in the borough in a week, cops said.
On May 10, Larry Maxwell was crossing the street outside his longtime home in Brownsville’s Langston Hughes Houses to attend a family event at the nearby Dr. Green Playground, when he was struck by a driver fleeing a fender-bender. The driver has not been caught, cops said.
The city has seen a 19% decrease in fatal crashes this year, although the number of pedestrians killed by motor vehicles has increased slightly, cops said.
As of Thursday, cops have investigated 40 pedestrian-killing collisions — two more than this time last year, according to police.
Originally Published: May 17, 2025 at 12:07 PM EDT
