A driver was charged with manslaughter in the deaths of a woman and two of her children in Brooklyn after slamming into another car and veering into a crosswalk, the police said.
The driver, Miriam Yarimi, 32, was charged on Saturday evening with second-degree manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, assault, reckless driving, speeding, failure to yield and driving with a suspended license, the police said.
The victims, Natasha Saada, 34, and her daughters, Diana, 8, and Deborah, 5, were taking a walk on Saturday afternoon when they were hit, the police said. (The police had initially said that Ms. Saada was 35.)
Ms. Saada’s 4-year-old son was injured in the crash, the police said. He was taken to Maimonides Medical Center in Borough Park, where he remained in critical condition on Sunday afternoon.
Two men and three other children were in the car that Ms. Yarimi hit; they were taken to nearby hospitals and were stable, the police said.
Ms. Yarimi was driving a blue Audi A3 sedan, the police said. Photos of the crash site showed the car overturned with the license plate “WIGM8KER.” According to NYCServ, the city’s database for unpaid tickets, a vehicle with the same license plate still has $1,345 in unpaid fines.
According to another website that tracks violations using city data, a vehicle with the same license plate has 99 parking and camera violations between August 2023 and March 23. Those violations, which include running red lights and speeding through school zones, amounted to nearly $10,500 in fines, the website said.
As of Sunday, Ms. Yarimi was at Bellevue Hospital for psychiatric evaluation, the police said.
A funeral for Ms. Saada and her daughters was held on Sunday evening at Shomrei Hadas Chapels in Borough Park, where hundreds gathered. Inside the large hall, women stood with tears streaming down their cheeks as the rabbis spoke.
After the service, mourners followed an ambulance in a procession east down 38th Street, with many sobbing as they walked.
“They’re not holding up,” said June Aboksis, 58, who described herself as a close friend of the family. “They’re wonderful people. She was a wonderful mother.”
“This affects our whole community,” Ms. Aboksis said. “How do you tell children that, oh, two children won’t be showing up to school tomorrow?”
Mayor Eric Adams also attended the service. A City Hall spokesman said the family planned to fly to Israel on Sunday night to bury Ms. Saada and her children.
At a news conference on Saturday, the mayor called the crash “a tragic, tragic accident of a Shakespearean proportion.”
The police received a 911 call on Saturday around 1 p.m. about the collision, along the border of the Gravesend and Midwood neighborhoods. Investigators found that Ms. Yarimi had been traveling north on Ocean Parkway in the Audi when she barreled into a silver Toyota Camry traveling west on Quentin Road, the police said.
The 63-year-old man driving the Toyota was attempting to turn right onto Ocean Parkway when the Audi struck his car’s back bumper. (The police initially said the man was 62.) The impact of the collision pushed his car to the side, while the Audi shot forward, striking the Saada family before flipping over, the police said.
Emergency medical workers transported Ms. Yarimi to a hospital in the Sunset Park neighborhood. The authorities said on Saturday that they were investigating whether Ms. Yarimi had been driving drunk.
There have been 35 traffic fatalities in New York City so far this year, according to data provided by the Police Department. The number represents a 42 percent decrease from the same period last year, which saw an unusually high number of pedestrian deaths compared with 2023.
The city said last year that both automated speed cameras and red-light cameras had helped reduce traffic deaths, but experts said that some drivers were still skirting penalties by obscuring their license plates. The Police Department has begun several operations this year to crack down on such violations.
“I will call it like it is: This was a horrific tragedy caused by someone who shouldn’t have been on the road,” Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said on Saturday. “A mother and two young children killed, another child fighting for his life, a family and neighborhood devastated in an instant.”
Marc Franco, 69, who lives on the corner of Ocean Parkway and Quentin Road, said he had witnessed the accident’s aftermath after hearing a loud crash.
On the street, Mr. Franco arrived at a gruesome scene. A woman’s lifeless legs protruded from underneath the Audi, which was upside down. Just feet away, two girls and a boy lay face up and bloodied in the street.
An emergency medical worker performed CPR on one child and then another until an ambulance arrived, Mr. Franco said.
Nearby, a man and his children emerged, shaken, from the Toyota, whose trunk had nearly been shorn off, Mr. Franco said. Members of the Fire Department arrived and pried open the door of the Audi. They then pulled out Ms. Yarimi and loaded her onto a stretcher.
Mr. Franco said minor accidents were common on Ocean Parkway, where drivers often drag race or spin doughnuts late at night, surpassing the 25-mile-per-hour speed limit. He estimated that Ms. Yarimi had been driving at least twice that speed.
“This is the most dangerous area, nobody goes 25,” Ike Yedid, 63, who also lives on Ocean Parkway, said.
Hours after the crash on Saturday, the two vehicles remained at the scene.
The hazard lights on the overturned Audi flashed orange. The Toyota rested yards away, off kilter. All around, there was debris: crushed glass, smashed rearview mirrors and bloodied fabric.
Nate Schweber and Olivia Bensimon contributed reporting.