Left fam to die
DWI guy’s pal whisked him away as 3 burned: DA
A COLD-HEARTED getaway driver helped his drunken pal flee a fiery Long Island wreck rather than try to save three members of a Queens family fatally trapped inside their burning car, prosecutors said Tuesday.
Demetri Stewart, 23, made the ghoulish decision after his boozed-up buddy O’Neil Sharpe slammed his speeding BMW into a Toyota on the Southern State Parkway in Bay Shore around 1:30 a.m. Sunday, prosecutors said.
The Toyota burst into flames — killing Ancio Ostane, 37, and his two children, Andy, 8, and Sephora, 4.
Ostane’s wife, Lucnie Bouaz-Ostane, 35, was the only family member who survived.
“Instead of helping the poor family that was trapped in that burning vehicle, the 8-year-old, the 4-year-old and the dad, this defendant gathered his friends,friends and took them away from the scene,” prosecutor Patricia Brosco said at Stewart’s Central Islip arraignment, noting that the suspect and his pal were returning from a boozy barbecue in separate cars.
“He didn’t help that family. He helped Sharpe, who had been drin drinking at that barbecue, hide his intoxication.”
Stewart, who is charged with leaving the scene of a death, fourth-degree criminal facilitation and third-degree hindering prosecution, was ordered held on $200,000 bond.
“My client will be proven innocent,” Stewart’s lawyer, Gregory Nanton,N said outside the courtroom.co
Stewart, of Cambria Heights, Q Queens, was charged a day after Sh Sharpe, 24, pleaded not guilty to ch charges of DWI and leaving the sc scene of an accident.
Sharpe was ordered held on $5 $500,000 bond. Prosecutors say th the Springfield Gardens, Queens, m man was sloshed and speeding w when he rear-ended the Ostane fa family car. He was arrested about fo four hours later in Rockville Centre after allegedly catching a ride fro from Stewart, prosecutors said.
“They did absolutely nothing to help this family and everything to help themselves,” John Prudenti, who heads the vehicular crimes unit at the Suffolk County district attorney’s office, said Tuesday after Stewart’s arraignment.
“Clearly, the evidence shows and will continue to show, that this defendant actively helped his friend as this car was burning, leave that scene and secrete him for approximately four hours.”