RP from LIW: Charges upgraded to murder in wedding crash

I hope he gets the max!!!

Charges upgraded to murder in wrong-way DWI crash

FROM NEWSDAY.COM

July 14, 2005, 10:46 AM EDT

Charges have been upgraded to murder for a Valley Stream man accused of drunkenly driving the wrong way on the Meadowbrook Parkway in a crash that killed a 7-year-old flower girl riding home from a wedding party.

Nassau County District Attorney Denis Dillon announced the changes today for Martin Heidgen, 24.

Last week, Heidgen was charged with two counts of manslaughter and driving while intoxicated. Today, those charges were upgraded to two counts of second-degree murder. To get a murder conviction in this case, a prosecutor would have to prove that Heidgen acted with depraved indifference to human life.

Robin Charlow, a professor at Hofstra University Law School, said depraved indifference happens when 'a person is just acting recklessly, but it's so beyond the pale that there's a grave risk of death.' Some examples would be shooting into a crowd, or opening a lion's cage at the zoo, she told Newsday last week.

The new murder charges carry a penalty of 25 years to life in prison. The DWI charge also remains. Heidgen is scheduled to be arraigned later this morning in First District Court in Hempstead.

State Police have said Heidgen's blood-alcohol level was 0.28, more than three times the legal limit, as he drove the wrong way on the parkway at around 2 a.m. on July 2, crashing his pickup truck head-on into a limousine carrying an extended family of six coming home from a Bayville wedding. Killed in the accident were Katie Flynn of Lido Beach, and driver Stanley Rabinowitz, 59, of Farmingdale. Katie Flynn's mother, father, 5-year-old sister, grandmother and grandfather also were injured.
Copyright 2005 Newsday Inc.

it's situations like this where i wish we had capital punishment!

This article is really sad too. Just so horrible.



In mom’s words: ‘Know this wasn’t just a car accident’

July 5, 2005

Jennifer Flynn, mother of 7-year-old Katie, spoke at a news conference in Mineola yesterday about the accident that killed her daughter. Her entire comments:

I wasn't going to speak about this, but as time went by I felt I needed to. I think that people need to know that this wasn't just a car accident. And as I read it in the paper, that's all I read, it was a horrible car accident. It was so much more than that.

We drove home from my sister's wedding. A beautiful, beautiful day. And we were hit head-on by someone going 70 miles an hour on the wrong side of the road. It was like an explosion. The fact that my husband made it out. He was separated by just a headrest \ It could have been him where Stanley [Rabinowitz] was. My mother landed straight at us. My father landed straight at us. As he dangled in the car, I wasn't even sure that he was OK or his legs were attached. It wasn't that he has two broken legs.

I don't think people understand the severity of what happened to us. As I crawled out of the car, the only thing that was left of Kate was her head. And I took her - just that - and sat on the side of the Meadowbrook and watched the horrendousness going on around me. I sat there for about an hour with her as they cut my entire family out of this crushed tin can that we survived.

And it was brutal. I hope that it's as brutal for you all as it was for me. And I want everybody to feel that and to feel our pain and to know our sadness. It was horrific.

He went to the hospital and it was still horrific. My husband was taken to South Nassau, my mother was taken to Nassau County Medical Center with myself and Kate and Grace and my father. My father had complications and then he had to go to Winthrop and my family has been between three different hospitals constantly. With all the care and support that we've had, it's been horrendous.

Reading in the paper again yesterday that someone's in stable condition or in critical condition but they're expected to make it, it's so much more than that. I spent from 2 to 4:30 with my mother last night as she wrote letters on my hand to ask me how my dad was. To spell it out. It was brutal.

Drunk driving did this to us. It's been horrific. I haven't been able to see my father yet because they don't know if I can come see him because it's too hard for him. My husband I saw for 15 minutes yesterday. It's horrific.

I don't want people to think this was a car accident. It was so much more than a car accident. Kate was stolen from us. Her life was cut terribly short. But the life that she led - and I want people to know this too - was fabulous. And I don't blame God. And I know that she's in a place that is far better than it ever was here and I'm happy that her life will never know any sadness or tragedy or anything. She only had beauty and we're so grateful for that.

But it was taken, and it was taken with drunk driving. And I want people to remember this and my family and not just Kate. My father who is suffering so badly. My mother who is suffering so badly. They think she'll be three weeks in the hospital, three months with a wheelchair. It wasn't just a car accident. Our family has been torn apart.

We're lucky and blessed that we have the family we have and the support from the community and the support from the police department. It's been unreal. And we're so thankful and the hospitals. And we need prayers and we need to be left alone.

I hope he gets the max sentence, and I hope once he goes to jail that he gets tortured & beat.

That article is so sad, but that poor woman - I cannot even imagine what she must feel....

I think his cell should be papered with pictures of little Katie... imagine, her mother cradling HER HEAD while the cops try to save the rest of her family!!!

Not to defend him, but if he's a decent human being, the grief and guilt might end up being more than he can stand.

Something needs to be done about DD.

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Posted by BMD'sPeanut

Not to defend him, but if he's a decent human being, the grief and guilt might end up being more than he can stand.

Something needs to be done about DD.

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I hope so..since he has a record of DD...BUT I am sure it won't stop him