By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Monday, July 15, 1991
The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A03
A 34-year-old Indiana tractor-trailer driver was arrested in Teaneck on Sunday after he fled the scene of an accident in upper Manhattan in which two elderly sisters were struck and killed by a truck, police said.
The accident occurred about 4:16 p.m. at the intersection of 179th Street and Broadway, said Sgt. Tina Mohrmann, a New York City police spokeswoman.
“We had a tractor-trailer going westbound,” Morhmann said. “He struck two elderly women, both of whom died at the scene.”
Eyewitnesses told police that the women, who had come out of an A & P supermarket near the intersection, were dragged along the pavement several feet by a truck.
Police identified the women as sisters: Betty Rosen, 83, and Claire Muller, 86, both of Manhattan.
A police lieutenant at a bus station at the intersection notified Port Authority Police at the George Washington Bridge about the truck, and two officers on the bridge spotted it, said Port Authority spokeswoman Terry Benczik.
Port Authority Police Officers Dennis Higgins and Michael Bucholz stopped the truck about 4:35 p.m. at the junction of Routes 95 and 80 in Teaneck, Benczik said.
The suspect, identified as Harold J. Weitzman of Peru, Ind.,was charged with eluding police and driving under the influence of a controlled substance, Benczik said.
Additional charges are pending in New York.
Benczik said the suspect was being held at the Port Authority police lockup at the George Washington Bridge and would be transferred to the Bergen County Jail to await arraignment.
Forensic technicians were examining the truck to confirm it was the vehicle involved in the accident, police said.
Keywords: MOTOR VEHICLE; ACCIDENT; NEW YORK CITY; TEANECK; WOMAN; AGED; VIOLATION; DEATH; VICTIM
ID: 17349457 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)
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