An alleged drunk driver plowed into a crowd celebrating the Fourth of July in a New York City park, killing three and injuring seven others.
A gray Ford F-150 sped through the intersection of Water Street and Jackson Street in Manhattan, blew through a stop sign just before 9 p.m. Thursday, jumped the sidewalk and then barreled through the crowd at Corlears Hook Park.
Four people were pinned under the truck.
"I can't get the screaming out of my head," one witness told the New York Post .
Three people were killed: a 59-year-old woman, a 38-year-old man and a woman in her 40s, WABC-TV reported.
The station said one person is in critical condition, while the others are in stable condition.
The youngest victim was 11 years old.
A mother and her two young kids were among the victims, the NYPD said at a late night news conference.
Witnesses said a number of families with children were in the park near the baseball field's bleachers barbecuing when the truck came speeding in.
"Once he did that hard right turn so many people started screaming. He turned into the batting field, that's where we normally barbecue. It's a family that we all know. The Lower East Side bands together," a neighbor told WABC, which obtained video of the crash.
"You have a tragic incident like this that really impacts family members who were just here, celebrating and barbecuing inside a park," Mayor Eric Adams told reporters during the news conference Thursday with NYPD and FDNY officials.
Watch as @NYCMayor and NYPD executives provide an update on an ongoing investigation in lower Manhattan. https://t.co/8A10zMAhGA
— NYPD NEWS (@NYPDnews) July 5, 2024
A group of people in the park held the driver down until police arrived.
The driver, who was identified as Daniel Hyden, 44, of South Brunswick, New Jersey, was taken into custody.
The NYPD said that officers smelled alcohol on his breath and "believe that alcohol may have played a role in this."
"I don't understand how a person can get into a car intoxicated or people with them and let them drive, knowing they can alter the lives of the people around them in such an intense and tragic way," the wife of a witness told the New York Post.
