Recent Streetsblog NYC posts about Traffic Justice

84-Year-Old Jaywalker Could Get Jail While Deadly Drivers Get Off Scot-Free

By Brad Aaron | Jan 21, 2014 | 42 Comments

Kang Wong, the 84-year-old pedestrian left bloodied during last weekend’s NYPD jaywalking crackdown, was arrested and charged by police. If convicted, Wong could get a jail term for an incident that stemmed from crossing the street without a walk signal. At the same time, the drivers who killed three pedestrians in the 24th precinct in […]

Drunk Driver Avoids Homicide Charge in Brooklyn Pedestrian Death [Updated]

By Brad Aaron | Jan 17, 2014 | 25 Comments

A motorist who has admitted to driving drunk in a crash that killed a Brooklyn pedestrian was not charged with homicide by District Attorney Charles Hynes or his successor Ken Thompson. He was allowed to plead guilty this week to a top charge of misdemeanor DWI, court records say, and faces a maximum sentence of […]

Bratton’s Bad Data on Pedestrian Injuries Won’t Get Us to Vision Zero

By Brad Aaron | Jan 16, 2014 | 43 Comments

Yesterday NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton said that in 73 percent of crashes in which a pedestrian was struck by a motorist in 2013, the pedestrian was at fault. Bratton presented that figure as an indictment of pedestrian behavior, and the stat was later parroted by the press. But more than anything it speaks to the victim-blaming bias […]

Cab Driver Who Killed 5-Year-Old Remains in Good Standing With TLC

By Brad Aaron | Dec 19, 2013 | 6 Comments

The cab driver who killed a 5-year-old child in Brooklyn last year is still on the road. Meanwhile, the civil suit filed by the victim’s parents was transferred to NYC this week from Texas, where the family lives. In April 2012, Timothy Keith and his mother and father were on their first trip to the city when, shortly after […]

Council Transpo Committee Passes NYPD Hit-and-Run Transparency Bill

By Brad Aaron and Stephen Miller | Dec 18, 2013 | 4 Comments

The City Council transportation committee passed a bill today that would require NYPD to issue quarterly reports on hit-and-run crashes and investigations. Originally, Intro 1055 would have had NYPD report to the council every two years on hit-and-runs resulting in serious injury or death. The language of the bill was tightened after sponsor Leroy Comrie and other committee members […]

Bronx Motorist Convicted of DWI, But Not Manslaughter, in Pedestrian Death

By Brad Aaron | Dec 18, 2013 | 2 Comments

A jury in the Bronx determined a motorist was impaired by alcohol and drugs when he struck and killed a pedestrian in 2011, but the jury acquitted the driver of manslaughter. Thomas Riley, 23, was crossing East Fordham Road near Bathgate Avenue at around 4:20 a.m. on March 20, 2011, when he was hit by […]

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