A crash at Whalley and Ellsworth Avenues Friday evening killed a 37-year-old motorcyclist.
The incident occurred around 5:30 p.m. Here’s what happened, according to police spokesman Officer David Hartman:
Viewing dash cam footage from a passing vehicle, investigators saw that the motorcyclist, Bobby Sunshine Pinkston, had been traveling east on Whalley when the driver of a Nisson Maxima was turning left onto Whalley from Ellsworth. They crashed. (A passing vehicle obscured the impact itself from the dash came video.)
The Nissan driver fled the scene. Then, when he stopped at Argonne Street, a man confronted him and “indicated” he knew about the crash. The witness started calling the cops; the Nissan driver fled on foot into an apartment building. A man on the porch asked if he was OK. The driver responded: “I’m OK. I need to call my wife. I hit a bike, I hit a bike.”
Soon after an “angry crowd” that had assembled pointed out the suspect to Officer John Brangi. Officers took the driver, who is 27 years old and lives on Ellsworth Avenue, into custody, later charging him with evading responsibility involving the death of a person, negligent homicide with a motor vehicle, operating a motor vehicle without a license, illegal operation under the influence of alcohol or drugs and making an improper turn.
The motorcyclist was taken to Yale-New Haven Hospital, where he later died from his injuries.
In other news, Hartman identified the 21-year-old man who was shot to death on a front porch of Maple Street on June 24 at 11:34 p.m. His name was Robert Faulk-Dill. He’d been shot “multiple times in the head, back, and groin.”
Hartman also reported the arrest of a 43-year-old man around 3 p.m. last Wednesday near East Rock’s summit on charges of public indecency and risk of injury of a child. Police received several reports of a man “publicly masturbating” by the summit; one witness helped the cops find him.
No license? Why was this person even on the road?
Shame we have effectively decriminalized all motor vehicle law through foolish civil liabilities and the resulting inability of police to protect us from drivers like this. Hardly any consolation to a family torn apart if you don't catch the driver until after the damage is done.