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There are way too many stories about drunk or careless drivers killing people, but this one hits close: A 25 year old NYU graduate student was killed by a hit-and-run driver at 2nd Avenue and 14th Street at about 1:30 AM Sunday morning. Hannah Engle and her sister had seen "24 Hours on Craigslist" earlier in the morning and parted when Engle was hit by a 2001 Hyundai driven by Wole Parks. Parks got out of the car and left the scene, but left his wallet in the car. He later turned himself into a precinct in Greenpoint and was charged with Parks was charged with "leaving the scene of an accident, driving with a suspended license and driving while intoxicated." A suspended license - plus driving while intoxicated! This is a street that many people walk on, and 1:30AM on a weekend night is just when people start coming out! These stories make Gothamist crazy.
According to the Daily News, Engle's sister, Rebecca Jupiter, actually saw the accident when she was about to go into the subway, saying, "I instantly recognized her hair. I just knew it was her. I just ran up to her, and there was blood on her face. She was not moving, and they put her in the ambulance."
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How can the NYPD be convinced to allocate manpower away from arresting bicyclists and pantsless subway riders to something useful like setting up sobriety checkpoints?
How can the NYPD be convinced to allocate manpower away from arresting bicyclists and pantsless subway riders to something useful like setting up sobriety checkpoints?
You know something Grif...I'll take the vast improvements in fighting crime over hte last 15 years to your armchair advice. Not that you couldn't be a latent genius...it's more likely that you're a latent...
What a sad story. The last I saw Wole Parks (the driver) he was a happy-go-lucky aspiring actor. We graduated in the same class at Stuyvesant, and periodically I would hear that he scored a commercial or a pilot. I remember his Kit-Kat "give me a break" commercial fondly.
This really doesn't sound like the kid I knew 6 years ago, but everyone knows alcohol makes you do stupid stuff. While I feel terrible for the victim, my heart also goes out to Wole and his family.
A pedestrian has to be so careful in this city. Crazy drivers turn without looking, jump the curb, what have you! I wish that every sidewayk would have concrete stancions or whateverthey're called, not big plater things, but something to keep cars where they belong.
As a mother, I am always pulling my kids away from the edge of the curb. They think just cause it's a curb it's ok to stand on the very edge.
You have to be careful!!!!!
Google "Wole Parks" and you will find he is a "progessive" Democratic activist. Perhaps now that he has drunkenly killed an innocent women, Ted Kennedy will hire him.
wow. this is crazy - i was in the same movie with her (that i had invited one sister to go to, and texted the other from) and cross that street all the time and it just makes you realize that POOF you can go just like that. and how many of us stand way out in the first lane to hail a cab or wait to cross... i know i cut it really close. makes you think.
I knew Hannah from College. She was an amazing woman that touched hundred of people's lives. She always went out of her way for people and it is a tragedy that she is gone.
I never knew Hannah but know her sister so this news is really affecting me. They'd just lost their grandmother recently and I recall how Rebecca reacted to that loss. Everyone's saying how Hannah had a gift for uniquely touching people's lives and I can say that she's touched mine, a total stranger. She sounds like someone to emulate. I wish you all peace this year.
Yes, he may have been involved in the death of this girl and there is no justification for that. But I've known Wole Parks for 11 years and he is no criminal, nor a thug like these papers make him out to sound. He simply made a foolish, costly mistake, which was getting behind the wheel after drinking. My heart goes out to the family of the deceased and...WOLE, If you read this...I'm with you man! I'm with you 100%.
There are very conflicting stories as to what actually happened that night, so perhaps I can create a new, much more accurate, picture for those of you stuck reading terribly spun newspaper articles. To begin with, Wole did not "flee" the scene of the accident as is being reported. He was dismissed by the police. They later came and arrested him after they found out the woman died. Second, if the police actually “smelled alcohol on his breath” at the time of the incident and/or found a “container of something smelling of alcohol in the vehicle”, it would stand to reason that they probably would not have let him go. Not the NYPD and especially not when there was a seriously injured woman nearby. So, the supposed "Police Spokesperson" hasn’t made a bit of sense yet. Finally, the woman was J-Walking while Wole had the green light. My heart goes out to everyone involved in this terrible accident, but I hope the “true” facts come out in the weeks to come.
Indeed, the facts of this case have not been made clear. It doesn't make sense that the police say they smelled alcohol on his breath but that he fled the scene. Which is it? I knew Wole from Stuy though I haven't seen him since 2000. I don't condone drinking and driving (if he was in fact drunk) but I feel like there is more to this tragic case than we have been told. My condolences go to both families.
Yes, he may have been involved in the death of this girl and there is no justification for that. But I've known Wole Parks for 11 years and he is no criminal, nor a thug like these papers make him out to sound. He simply made a foolish, costly mistake, which was getting behind the wheel after drinking. My heart goes out to the family of the deceased and...WOLE, If you read this...I'm with you man! I'm with you 100%.
I have a number of things in common with Mr. Parks, and recognize that he's not a thug. But killing someone while driving drunk is NOT a 'foolish mistake'. Top that off with a suspended license. It's nothing short of a serious crime. It's called depraved indifference. Yep, that's the sort of 'stupid stuff' that alcohol makes you do. It makes you indifferent in a depraved manner.
It makes you illegally get behind the wheel of a car, drunk, when the state has told you that your behavior around drinking and driving is not dangerous enough to revoke your privilege. It makes you disappear from the scene of an accident that that behavior precipitated. It makes you fight, or flee, to maintain your freedom to continue drinking, even while you feel a horrible guilt for having robbed the world of another wonderful young person.
I hope that the NYPD is able to establish that Mr. Parks was above the legal BAC limit at the time of the accident even though he was able to give himself a several-hour head start to beating the test. If they talk to the bartenders, the other people at the bar, the bodega clerk, the people at the party he was at in the hours before the accident, they should be able to establish that.
I sympathize with Mr. Parks' aspiration and politics. But I firmly believe that he should get the help he needs for his problems, while serving a reasonable term of punishment, in the New York penitentary system, for killing Ms. Engle.