Not even the sweet release of death can liberate you from New York's relentless parking ticket blitz. Early Tuesday morning a traffic cop came across Nicholas Rappold, 21, of Flushing, who was slumped across the front seat of his Jeep Cherokee on 165th Street near 35th Avenue. Rappold was dead, but just because you've gone to your eternal resting place doesn't mean you can park it wherever you want. Dying drivers should really know this by now.
Rappold was issued a summons for illegally parking during street sweeping hours, and the officer moved on to find other stiffs to screw. Hours earlier, Rappold had been visiting a friend, and had left late Monday night. When his pal later noticed the Jeep Cherokee still parked out front, he became concerned and went to check on Rappold, discovering his cold corpse. Rappold's family believes he died from a drug overdose, but the cause of death has not been officially determined.
"It's really messed up," Rappold's cousin Patrick Hill tells the Daily News. "While he was dead in his car, a New York City traffic agent gave him a ticket. She could have at least knocked on the window to see if he was all right." Investigators interviewed the traffic agent but found no wrongdoing, and a source tells the tabloid, "He had heavily tinted windows." But in the end, Rappold actually got lucky, because the police have voided his parking summons!
