The brother of a 35-year-old dirt bike rider who was killed after being thrown into the path of an unlicensed, out-of-state Mercedes driver said he’s traumatized by the loss and no longer wants to drive.
Victim Detwan Hannah was heading north on Malcolm X Blvd. near Macon St. in Bedford-Stuyvesant on his 2017 Kawasaki dirt bike when he hit a dip in the pavement and was thrown onto the roadway about 9 p.m. Tuesday.
The Mercedes-Benz driver, Keon Davis, then struck Hannah as he lay in the road as Davis tried to pass an MTA bus, cops said. The 28-year-old driver, who lives in Lithonia, Ga., was hit with criminally negligent homicide charges for the fatal crash.
“I’m supposed to be getting my permit, but I don’t even want to drive now,” said Troy Jackson, the victim’s younger brother. “I don’t want to be in nobody’s car. I don’t want to drive. I don’t even want to see a car at this point. I’ve been taking a bus and trains, but I can’t do cars right now.”
Days before Hannah was killed, Jackson’s adoptive mother was in a car crash and died during surgery afterward.
“I lost my mother and I lost my brother within two days… It’s way too much,” Jackson, 33, said.
Jackson, who lives in Binghamton, N.Y., had plans this weekend to visit Hannah, who was going to help him lay his mother to rest.
“He was gonna be the one who got everybody out of being sad,” Jackson said. “He was supposed to be keeping me company for the next couple of days, so I could bury my adopted mom. Now I don’t have nobody. I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do next. I’m still trying to process this…”
Jackson described his brother as a positive person and a loving father to his 9-year-old daughter.
“He was an outstanding person,” he said. “He would bring any good outcome out of a bad situation. That’s who he was.”
Hannah was working for a fire safety inspection company, but had dreams of one day running his own security company.
He lived in East Williamsburg with his daughter, his daughter’s mother and her 14-year-old son, whom he treated as his own.
“He was a kind person,” Tawana Brown, his daughter’s mom, said. “He helped everybody. You needed the help, he was there for you for anything.”
“I want justice,” Brown, 36, added. “My daughter can’t see her father no more.”
Jackson said Hannah loved riding his dirt bike and tried to convince him to get one himself so they could ride together.
“When Twan is on that dirt bike, that man feels free,” he said.
Video of the Tuesday night crash obtained by the Daily News shows Hannah fall to the roadway, then try to regain his feet before lying down in the road’s northbound lane.
The northbound Mercedes can then be seen traveling in the southbound lane as the driver passes a B64 bus, and continues on as a passerby raises his hand and repeatedly screams, ‘Stop!’ The driver then strikes Hannah while veering back over the double yellow line, the footage shows.
A witness told the Daily News that Hannah was dragged by the luxury sedan for about a quarter block before the car came to a stop near a smoke shop.
“I went over, and he was pinned under the car from the chest down,” said Hashed Al-Zokari. “He was still a little bit breathing. It was horrible. That night, I couldn’t sleep at all.”
Medics rushed Hannah to Kings County Hospital, where he died.
Jackson blasted the city, saying it should be cracking down on out-of-control, unlicensed drivers like Davis.
“I feel like New York should be a lot stricter with unlicensed drivers and there should be some real, real laws behind stuff like this,” he said, “because it’s not the first time an accident like this has happened and I’m pretty sure it’s not gonna be the last time. These people don’t pay attention to the road. I don’t like that about New York.”
Davis pleaded not guilty during a brief arraignment proceeding Thursday. A judge ordered him held on $100,000 bail, court records show.