New York State police have charged the driver involved in a fatal parkway crash in Hauppauge with drunken driving.
Investigators said 22-year-old Jose Mauricio Maldonado Santos of Centereach was drunk and gave police a false name following the Wednesday morning crash on the Northern State Parkway near Exit 46.
He was charged with driving while intoxicated and false impersonation. A bedside arraignment is being arranged for him at Stony Brook University Medical Center, where he is being treated for a broken arm and a chest pneumothorax, or an air pocket in the chest.
Santos had been at a bar in Huntington Station several hours before the crash, which occurred shortly before 7 a.m., according to a police spokesman. The car had veered into the center median and struck a tree, killing Front seat passenger Fransisco Mejias Morales, 23, who lived with the driver, police said.
Izac Mejia Morales, 23, and Neptali Mejias Morales, 18, two backseat passengers who also lived at the same address, were injured, as was Juan Carlos Santos, 22, who lives nearby the other victims in Centereach, when the three were ejected from the rear window. They were all treated for lacerations and contusions.