Cabbie Who Fatally Struck Boy Has Many Moving Violations

On August 14, a cab driver struck and killed 8-year-old Axel Pablo who was crossing 112th Street near Lexington Avenue. While some witnesses said the driver was speeding and talking on his cellphone, police investigators reportedly found no evidence of Shaiful Alam being on his phone and did not charge him. Now it turns out that Alam has "an astounding 11 points on his license from July 2007 to July 2008," according to the Post, which adds, "Under state law, a driver with 11 points or more in an 18-month period gets an automatic license suspension. State officials could not immediately determine why that did not happen to Alam."

The violations include things like "failure to stop at a stop sign and blowing a red light" "disobeying a 'traffic device." The Taxi and Limousine Commission only realized this during a review of all taxi, livery and black car drivers, according to the Daily News: "It discovered 2,400 TLC-licensed drivers have state records warranting TLC hearings that could lead to license suspension or revocation."

While Alam's license could have been suspended after a June 1 infraction, the TLC said, "Given the typical time frame for the hearing and appeal processes, it is likely that Mr. Alam's TLC license would not have been revoked before the fatal accident," but added it would "put in place new measures to speed the process up and complete license checks more frequently, so drivers with accrued points are taken off the road faster." The TLC is currently (finally?) moving to revoke Alam's license; the Post says the hearings and appeals process, during which drivers can still be on the road, can take up to three years on average.