By The newspaper
13 Jul 2024, 15:13 PM EDT
Jaynelyse Valdez was hit by a car outside Harlem Hospital and despite being so close to the emergency room, they were unable to prevent her death, just days before her 4th birthday next Monday.
The girl was with her mother and two siblings, including a 4-month-old baby, when she was struck Thursday, July 11 around 7:30 p.m. by a Nissan Pathfinder turning the corner of W. 135th St. and Lenox Ave., the NYPD said.
“I was going to turn four on the 15th,” he told Daily News her paternal grandmother, Kenia. “She was so happy, so smart, so loving.”
The girl, her 37-year-old mother and her two siblings — a 2-year-old and a newborn — were visiting an aunt in Harlem when the tragedy occurred. The boy suffered a blow to the head, family members said. The rest of the family was unharmed.
“The guy who hit her picked her up and took her to the hospital,” said a witness who asked not to be identified. “He was with his family… It was terrible. That poor baby and her mother were hysterical.”
The unidentified 40-year-old driver remained at the scene and no charges have been announced against him. In a similar case, in March a Latino boy was killed near his home and his older brother was injured when the driver of an “impatient and reckless” pickup truck swerved around another car at a green light and crashed into a crosswalk in Queens (NYC) yesterday.
Authorities remind that there is zero tolerance for drivers who drive at excessive speed and/or under the influence of alcohol and drugs. Cyclists and motorcyclists are also frequent protagonists of road accidents, as victims and perpetrators, by riding on sidewalks, disregarding traffic lights and even the direction of the streets.
In May, a 71-year-old Puerto Rican grandmother was killed when she was run over by a driver fleeing from the police in Brooklyn (NYC) and left the scene by getting on the subway. Her daughter was injured. Ironically, just hours before, Governor Kathy Hochul had signed the so-called Sammy’s Law, which reduces the speed limit to 20 mph and even 10 mph on some streets in the five boroughs of NYC to protect pedestrians. So far this year, more than 40 people have been killed in car accidents in the city.
In December, Gov. Hochul signed “Angelica’s Law,” designed to keep drivers with prior suspensions off the road by charging repeat offenders who operate vehicles after committing five or more traffic violations that resulted in suspensions or revocations with felonies.
- 2024 is the deadliest year on New York’s asphalt since Vision Zero was created to prevent deaths