Catchogue, NY — Several young women were in a limousine for a party in Cutchogue last Saturday when they were hit by a drunk driver in a pickup truck. Four women were killed: Amy Grabina, 23, Brittany Schulman, 23, Larun Baruch, 24, and Stephanie Belli, 23. The accident happened as their limousine was headed back from Vinyard 48 off Highway 48. Also injured in the accident were:
- Carlos Pino, 58 (Bethpage) – limo driver
- Joelle Dimonte, 25 (Elwood)
- Melissa Crai, 23 (Scarsdale)
- Alicia Arundel, 24 (Setauket)
- Olga Lipets, 24 (Brooklyn)
According to the police reports, 55-year old Steven Romeo was driving his pickup truck along Highway 48 that night and was allegedly going at a high rate of speed when he crashed into the side of Pino’s limo, which was trying to make a U-turn from Depot Lane.
The accident did major damage and paramedics said that Romeo was injured along with the others and required a hospital visit. He has since been charged with DWI, though his BAC hasn’t been released yet.
Update: Though it might not have much relevance here, Romeo was involved in a fatal work-related accident last January 2014, when a bucket fell of a skid-steer he was using and crushed another worker to death. This has been all over the news, so I thought I would include it here.
Update: The police have come out and said that Mr. Romeo actually wasn’t intoxicated at the time, his BAC was reportedly 0.066%, which is lower than the legal limit of 0.08%.
Map of the Area
View from the Road
Commentary:
Update
So, it appears that alcohol was a factor here, but maybe it’s not as big a deal as people once thought. I realize that a BAC of .06% is still very much “under the influence” of alcohol, but the news reports initially made it sound like he was 5X over the legal limit. So why am I harping on this issue? Didn’t this driver cause a major accident that hurt a lot of lives?
Yes, that’s all true. But like I said in my original thoughts below, I’m still not convinced the limousine driver didn’t have some role in this — big or small. A recent report from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety said that the limousine in this accident didn’t have key safety features that might’ve kept these women safe.
Without going into all the details, limousines are basically cars that are stretched to accommodate more seats, which means that extra pillars are added in the limo to support the structural “cage” of the vehicle. It doesn’t look like this limousine had any of those protective features, plus the IIHS pointed out that most limos don’t have curtain (above the head) airbags because manufacturers don’t make them that big.
The more I learn about this accident, the less I’m inclined to point all the blame at this driver under the influence.
Original
I don’t want to minimize what happened here in this tragic accident, but I want to shift our attention away from the accused drunk driver for a moment and look at the limo driver instead. Yes, the accident was caused by the speeding driver whom police think was intoxicated – nobody is arguing that – but I think the limo driver here may have contributed.
A U-turn is a risky maneuver in any kind of vehicle, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen a limousine try to make a U-turn — especially on such a busy stretch of the highway. Given the length of a limo, that would be a very wide turn indeed. As you can see on the map above, the road curves slightly in either direction, making a U-turn even more dangerous as you’re basically helpless if someone comes speeding around the bend, which is exactly what happened here.
Again, I don’t want to detract from the punishment this driver may (and should) receive for driving while intoxicated, but maybe someone should be taking a look at the limo driver as well. It seems like he wasn’t being as careful as he could have been.
— Grossman Law Offices
