NEW YORK — A New York City police sergeant who hurled a plastic cooler at a person fleeing officers on a motorized scooter, inflicting a crash that killed the motive force, says he was attempting to guard different officers from being injured.
Testifying Monday at his manslaughter trial, Erik Duran mentioned he was not attempting to injure Eric Duprey, 30, when he threw the cooler filled with ice, water and sodas in August 2023. Authorities have mentioned Duprey, a father of three, had simply offered medication to an undercover officer when he tried to drive off.
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Duprey, who was not sporting a helmet, misplaced management of his scooter and crashed right into a tree earlier than falling to the pavement. He suffered deadly head accidents and died virtually instantaneously, prosecutors mentioned.
“He was gonna crash into us,” Duran, 38, informed the courtroom. “I mean, I didn’t have time. All I had time for was to try again to stop or to try to get him to change directions. That’s all I had the time to think of.”
Besides the manslaughter cost, Duran additionally faces criminally negligent murder and assault fees. The nonjury trial is being prosecuted by the state legal professional basic’s workplace, which investigates civilian deaths throughout encounters with regulation enforcement.
During their cross-examination, prosecutors urged Duran had extra time to suppose than he urged, saying he selected to select up a heavy cooler with each arms as a substitute of telling the opposite officers to maneuver.
Joseph Bianco, one of many prosecutors within the case, requested Duran if he had warned his colleagues concerning the approaching scooter. When Duran mentioned he didn’t have time to do this, Bianco famous that what the officer “did have time to do is to take two steps forward down that sidewalk” and choose up the cooler.
Duran disputed that the cooler was heavy. He additionally testified that after the crash, he instantly tried to assist Duprey when he noticed his accidents.
“I said, ‘Can you hear me? Can you hear me?’ And then I started to notice his injury, and he was in bad shape,” Duran testified.
Duran faces as much as 25 years in jail if convicted on the manslaughter depend. Closing arguments had been scheduled for Tuesday.
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