A Brighton Beach man faces 15 years behind bars for fatally striking a motorcyclist while driving drunk in Kensington and then lying to cops about it earlier this year.
Christopher Diaz, 24, was arraigned Tuesday, Sept. 3, on a 17-count indictment that included charges of manslaughter, vehicular manslaughter, and conspiracy, and Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice William Miller ordered him held on $200,000 bail.
Prosecutors claim Diaz struck and killed 28-year-old father Evvon Alexander at Ocean Parkway and Beverley Road in the early hours of May 27, striking the biker at more than 80 miles per hour in a 25 miles per hour zone, splitting his motorcycle in half, and launching the victim into a row of parked cars.
Paramedics rushed him to Maimonides Hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Afterwards, Diaz told police that his girlfriend, 23-year-old Homecrest resident Jasmin Morales-Cruz — who had only had one drink to his eight — was driving at the time, according to Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez.
Two passengers also said that Morales-Cruz was driving at the time, but admitted days later that Diaz was driving and had asked them to lie, prosecutors claim.
Investigators also found surveillance footage of Diaz, his girlfriend, and their passengers drinking at three different bars, along with video of Diaz getting into the driver’s seat shortly before the collision, Gonzalez said.
“A thorough and comprehensive investigation by my office showed that these defendants allegedly lied to police in order to help the driver of this vehicle to escape justice for slamming into a law-abiding motorcyclist and killing him. The victim was a father whose family is now devastated,” Gonzalez said.
Cops arrested Morales-Cruz on charges of vehicular manslaughter, but those charges will be dismissed in lieu of a new top charge of hindering prosecution, which carries a maximum sentence of four years in prison, according to spokeswoman for the District Attorney’s office Helen Peterson.
Chun ordered Diaz to return to court on Sept. 23.
