“Heroes” Catch Hit-&-Run Driver

After cornering a hit-and-run driver in a parking lot, Sajjad Chaudhary wondered: What if he has a gun?

Chaudhary pulled out a weapon of his own: his cellphone camera.

The man was trying to get away. Chaudhary, a Pakistani immigrant, and his son Ali wanted to make sure the man stayed where was until the cops arrived.

“Just put your hands up now!” Chaudhary told the man. ​“I give you the order now! Just put your hands up there! I tell you one more time! … Stand right there! You cannot go!”

Thanks to the Chaudharys, the man did not go. The cops arrived and made an arrest.

And they dubbed the Chaudharys ​“heroes.”

Closing Up Shop

The Chaudharys didn’t know they were about to become heroes Monday when they locked up their auto-repair and used-car lot, Dynamic Auto at 271 Whalley Ave., at the close of business around 7:30 p.m.

They got into their 2004 Mercedes Benz to head home to East Haven. Sajjad was behind the wheel. He turned left onto Whalley, stopped at the light at Sherman Avenue.

Ali called his dad’s attention to the corner, where a man and woman were fighting. ​“Fighting and kissing,” Sajjad noted.

The woman began walking through the intersection. Sajjad and Ali said they next saw the driver of a dark-colored Saturn speeding on Sherman pull around two cars that were stopped at the light, into oncoming traffic. The driver then swerved back into his lane — and his car struck the woman.

“We saw her twirling in the air and hit the ground,” Ali said.

The Saturn driver sped off. Sajjad turned onto Sherman and followed the driver as he sped onto Henry Street and cut left into the parking lot at the Prescott Bush senior housing complex on County.

Sajjad pulled into the lot. He parked his Benz in the entrance so the driver couldn’t escape.

Then he and his son got out of the car. Ali called 911 as they approached the driver, who had gotten out of his car, too.

The driver had his keys in his hand. Ali snatched the keys.

“I was nervous,” he would later recall.

“I was scared and nervous. But I didn’t want this guy to run away from there,” Sajjad said.

“He was so drunk he thought we were cops,” Ali said of the cornered driver.

The man twice started to run away. Sajjad grabbed his shirt. He held onto the collar. ​“I was thinking he might have a gun.” And Sajjad didn’t have a gun. He whipped out his cellphone to record the rest as he waited for cops to arrive. (The video is above in this story.)

Officers arrived soon after and arrested the driver, who lives on George Street.

“Investigating officers smelled alcohol on [the driver’s] breath. His speech was slurred. He was sent to police headquarters and subjected to a alcohol urine test. During the testing process, [the driver] told the officers he would ​‘pee dirty’ because he’d smoked marijuana and snorted cocaine earlier in the day. We’re waiting for the test results to see if he was right,” police spokesman Officer David Hartman reported in a release Tuesday.

​“Amid [the driver’s] tirade of foul language directed at the officers and his declaration they’d all ​‘go to hell,’ he was arrested and charged with assault in the second degree, felony evading with a MV (based on probable cause he was under the influence), DUI, reckless driving and several other motor vehicle offenses.”

The woman whom the driver allegedly hit, a 34-year-old woman named Charlotte Fox, was ​“rushed to the hospital, where staff soon determined her injuries were serious but likely not life-threatening,” according to Hartman. He said she broke a leg.

Automobile Row

Sajjad Chaudhary, who is 54 years old, said he hadn’t encountered an incident like last night’s before.

He grew up in Lahore, Pakistan, where he developed a love of cars. He began working for a vehicle-repair shop at 13, he said, starting on motorcycles, advancing to cars, eventually rebuilding diesel engines.

His dad moved the family to the U.S. in 1985. Sajjad opened an auto repair shop in Manchester, Connecticut. When Stop & Shop bought the lot in 2008, he decided to buy the business on Whalley Avenue, where he figured he could serve a bigger market. Ali, who’s 20, has joined him working in the shop.

Sajjad said he plans to bring flowers to the crash victim.