Hundreds March In Park Slope For Safer Streets After Deadly Crash

PARK SLOPE, NY — Hundreds of children, residents and elected officials marched around Park Slope Monday night to call the city to make safety improvements to streets after two children were killed in a crash last week.

The NYC Kids March for Safe Streets started in Prospect Park and ended at Ninth Street and Fifth Avenue, where a driver ran into five pedestrians killing Joshua Lew, 1, and Abigail Blumenstein, 4. The crash also injured their mothers.

"These were preventable deaths," said Paul Steely White, executive director of Transportation Alternatives. "Too many of our streets still lack proven, safety upgrades that are saving lives on streets like Queens Boulevard."

Borough President Eric Adams Comptroller Scott Stringer, Public Advocate Letitia James, Rep. Nydia Valázquez, Council Speaker Corey Johnson and City Council members Brad Lander and Carlos Menchaca joined the march and promised to fight for new laws to crack down on dangerous drivers and add safety measures to the city's streets.

"The trauma doesn't stop when the vehicle hits the object, it doesn't stop when it destroys the body," said Adams. "It rips apart the anatomy of our community and we live through this over and over again.

"The only way we can start the process of true healing is to heal our streets," Adams added.

So far this year, three children have died in Brooklyn after they were hit by drivers. In January, 13-year-old Kevin Flores was killed after an unlicensed oil truck driver struck him while riding his bike in Bed-Stuy.

The driver, Philip Monfoletto, was charged with aggravated unlicensed operation of a vehicle.

"Mr. De Blasio, I'm telling you we have to change the law," said Margarita Flores, Kevin Flores' mother, through a translator.

"We need a law that has deeper consequences because if we don't have deeper consequences everyone is going to feel like they can continue to do the things that they're doing."

Last week, Dorothy Bruns, 44, was stopped at the red light at Ninth Street and Fifth Avenue when she lost control of her 2016 Volvo S60, drove past the light and slammed into five pedestrians.

The children were taken to Methodist Hospital where they were pronounced dead, police said. Their mothers — Ruthie Ann Blumenstein and Lauren Lew — were taken to the same hospital for non-life-threatening injuries and a 46-year-old man was also hurt in the crash.

Blumenstein, a Tony-award winning actress whose stage name is Ruthie Ann Miles, was taken out of the ICU and her unborn baby survived the crash, according to a family announcement.

"We are extremely grateful for your kindness and generosity," Blumenstein's family posted on Twitter. "Please continue to pray for the Lew and the Blumenstein families as we process the unthinkable and lay our grief in the loving arms of Jesus."

Bruns' license plate had 12 violations associated with it, including four for running a red light and four for speeding in a school zone, police said.

She reportedly had a history of seizures and heart conditions and a law enforcement source said she had a seizure before she lost control of her car last week.

A group of state lawmakers announced a series of bills on Friday that aims to crack down on reckless drivers getting behind the wheel by using data collected by speed cameras, NYPD and doctors to suspend their licenses.

The bills include requiring doctors to notify the state DMV if a driver has a medical condition that could cause them to lose control of their vehicle, allowing the DMV to suspend their license because of it.

Another would create mandatory suspensions for license plates that repeatedly get issued violations by red-light camera within a certain time period.

Alison Collard de Beaufort, whose classmate Sammy Cohen-Eckstein, 12, died in 2013 after being struck by a van, joined Monday's march and put up a teddy bear near the intersection where Blumenstein and Lew were killed.

She bought nearly 40 bears in 2013 and started to put them up after her friend died to let drivers know children live in the area, adding ones to corners where other kids were killed as well. The bear she put up Monday night was the last one she had.

"I want this to be the last time that my friends and I put these up on lamposts because another child has been killed on our streets," said Collard de Beaufort. "Enough is enough and change needs to happen now."

Images: Nicholas Rizzi/Patch