Impact of horrific Upper West Side crash sent victims ‘flying several feet,’ prosecutors say

The out-of-control drunk driver who killed two — whom he personally knew — and injured three others during a blistering caught-on-camera Upper West Side crash hit his victims so hard that they were sent “flying several feet,” prosecutors said Monday.

Horrifying surveillance footage recovered by police shows the victims being knocked out of the camera frame following the Friday evening crash at W. 109th St. and Amsterdam Ave.

Elvin Suarez, 61, struck four men on a pedestrian median and slammed into a parked, occupied van that started a five-car pileup, police say. He is charged with vehicular homicide, vehicular manslaughter, and drunk driving.

Despite the devastation he caused, he managed to get out of his mangled Mercedes-Benz SUV and was found lying on the ground when first responders arrived, Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Zachary Kaplan told Judge Harriet Howard during a brief arraignment proceeding in Manhattan Criminal Court.

He was just a few feet away from one of his victims, Jason Negron, who prosecutors said was found pinned under the Mercedes and jammed next to a parking meter.

Negron was several feet from where he was struck, prosecutors said. His neighbors tried their best to lift the SUV off of Negron to no avail.

“It was like 40 people. There was a lot of people at the scene just trying to move the vehicle off of him, but that car was just not budging at all,” neighbor Louis Lopez told the Daily News Sunday. “We attempted to try and take off any safety brakes or mechanisms that the car might have, but it just wasn’t allowing the car to move at all.”

“My heart was completely shattered at that point,” Lopez, 30, added. “I just felt hopeless and kind of useless. Especially when you know somebody.”

Suarez knew both Negron, 46, and 35-year-old Michael Saint-Hilaire, who was also killed in the crash. Three others, including a 51-year-old man who was seated in a parked car when the crash occurred, were also injured, but expected to survive.

“These are all people that we literally grew up with…. They all knew each other,” he said. “That was just inconsiderate. He took two innocent people’s lives, people who didn’t deserve it.”

When cops arrived, they smelled alcohol on Suarez’s breath, Kaplan told the judge. Suarez later scored a 0.1%, on a Breathalyzer test, well over the 0.08% legal threshold for drunken driving.

Prosecutors asked that Suarez, who has a criminal history that includes a grand larceny arrest in 1981 and misdemeanor convictions in the late 1980s, be remanded.

Judge Howard ordered Suarez be held on $250,000 bail.

“While there are no words that can ease the pain caused by this tragedy, the Suarez family wants to express their deepest and most sincere condolences to those who lost loved ones, those who were injured and people in the community who have been affected by this tragedy,” said his attorney, Lawrence Fisher.

Suarez was three blocks from his home when the crash occurred. Police sources said he may have been going as fast as 80 mph when he crashed.

Negron had two daughters, one in high school, the other who just finished her first year in college, friends said. Saint-Hilaire was the father of young triplets and was looking forward to celebrating their second birthday. He worked for Mount Sinai Health System and aspired to be a cop.