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Baby Whose Parents Died in Car Crash Also Dies Calls to Charge Driver Grow After Couple’s Newborn Dies
(about 1 hour later)
A day after a car crash claimed the lives of a young couple in Brooklyn and their son was born prematurely in an emergency procedure, the baby died on Monday, the police said. Minutes before the crash, they were strangers inhabiting vastly different Brooklyns.
The death of the baby, delivered about three months early, elevated the sadness in the couple’s tight-knit Orthodox Jewish community in Williamsburg, which had sought solace in the newborn’s survival. His death also served to reinvigorate calls to bring serious criminal charges against the driver of the BMW sedan that struck the livery vehicle that his parents, Raizy and Nathan Glauber, both 21, were riding in. Raizy and Nathan Glauber, a recently married couple filled with the worry of first-time parents-to-be, climbed into a livery cab and headed to the hospital to check on her pregnancy.
Police officials on Monday identified the driver as Julio Acevedo, 44, of Brooklyn, who fled the scene of the crash. He was still being sought on Monday afternoon. Julio Acevedo, 44, who struggled with alcohol and a history of serious criminal activity, took the wheel of a borrowed BMW, the police said.
The owner of the BMW, Takia Walker, 29, of the Bronx, was arrested on Sunday on charges of insurance fraud, accused of buying and registering the car under false pretenses. In the early Sunday morning darkness, the BMW slammed into the side of the livery car, causing injuries that claimed the lives of the Glaubers, who were both 21. The magnitude of the tragedy grew even larger on Monday, when the couple’s newborn son, delivered prematurely in an emergency procedure, succumbed to the trauma.
The crash occurred Sunday just after midnight. The Glaubers, feeling something may have been wrong with the pregnancy, called a livery cab to take them to a hospital. Their cab was struck on the driver’s side by the BMW with such force that Ms. Glauber was ejected onto the pavement and both cars were mangled. Mr. Glauber was taken to Beth Israel Medical Center in Manhattan, and his wife was taken to Bellevue Hospital Center, where the baby was delivered prematurely and intubated. The parents were pronounced dead early Sunday. The baby’s death strengthened calls in the couple’s tight-knit Orthodox Jewish community in Williamsburg to bring serious criminal charges against the driver. He had served time in prison for a 1987 killing and was charged last month with drunken driving.
The police said that Mr. Acevedo would, at minimum, face charges for fleeing the scene of an accident. Investigators may seek to establish whether he was drunk at the time of the accident, a task made more difficult by his flight from the scene. Police and witness accounts had indicated that there was a female passenger in the BMW, but police officials said Monday that Mr. Acevedo had been driving alone. A friend of Mr. Acevedo’s from prison, Derrick Hamilton, said Mr. Acevedo had called him at least four times since the crash, seeking guidance and advice. “He has remorse,” Mr. Hamilton said. “He wants to turn himself in.”
A witness told the police that the BMW had been traveling at a high rate of speed on Kent Avenue in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, when it struck the cab as it turned onto the avenue from Wilson Street. “He said he came down that block, the cab turned and he didn’t even see it and he hit it,” Mr. Hamilton added.
“The driver of the BMW was doing at least 60 miles an hour when it hit the other vehicle,” said Paul J. Browne, the Police Department’s chief spokesman. Mr. Acevedo told Mr. Hamilton that he was driving at a high speed because a man had fired a gun at him shortly before the accident.
The deaths of the couple brought more than 1,000 mourners onto the street outside Congregation Yetev Lev D’Satmar in Williamsburg on Sunday for a heart-rending funeral service, as sobs and wails punctuated the words spoken in grief. There will not be a similar service for the boy; he will be buried with his parents in Orange County, N.Y. Paul J. Browne, the chief spokesman of the New York Police Department, said Mr. Acevedo had not yet contacted the police and would face, at the minimum, charges for fleeing the scene of an accident. He could not confirm Mr. Acevedo’s account of being shot at.
Rabbi Mayer Berger, director of operations for Chesed Shel Emes, which runs a group that provides free funerals for people who die without relatives, said he was at the hospital early Sunday when the baby was delivered and when Ms. Glauber was pronounced dead. The BMW’s owner, Takia Walker, 29, of the Bronx, was arrested on Sunday on charges of insurance fraud; she is accused of buying and registering the car under false pretenses. Mr. Hamilton said the woman and Mr. Acevedo did not know each other and that Mr. Acevedo had probably borrowed the car from a mutual friend.
“The happiness that was on one side of the room versus the tragedy on the other side was unbelievable,” Rabbi Berger said. “And for a coward to leave the scene, it’s unbelievable; it makes it so much worse.” Two weeks ago, when Mr. Acevedo was charged with driving under the influence of alcohol, he was released on his own recognizance. He is to appear in court on April 10.
Under their interpretation of Jewish law, Hasidim do not perform funerals for newborns who do not survive 30 days, according to Mendel Rosenberg, of Chesed Shel Emes. In the accident on Sunday, Mr. Browne said, Mr. Acevedo was driving the BMW “at least 60 miles an hour when it hit the other vehicle.”
Grossly excessive speed can be the basis of criminal charges like manslaughter or homicide, prosecutors said. Such cases are easier to prosecute when the driver is intoxicated. But it could prove hard to determine sobriety or intoxication because Mr. Acevedo left the scene.
The decision to bring strong charges will probably depend on the reconstruction of the crash by investigators from the Police Department’s specialized squad of vehicular crime detectives. “That process is not overnight,” said John B. Kwasnoski, a crash reconstruction expert who has conducted training for New York detectives. “The reconstruction of the crash can take, in some cases, months.”
Investigators will seek to recreate the moment of impact — the speed of the vehicles, the situation on the road and, to the extent possible, the state of mind of those involved.
“Every crash is a totality of the circumstances,” said Maureen McCormick, chief of vehicular crimes at the Nassau County district attorney’s office. “Then it becomes a weighing of that totality against the case law.”
Yet prosecutors said recent case law had cast a pall over aggressively pursuing errant drivers. The state’s Court of Appeals has overturned a number of recent cases involving homicide charges against drivers, leading prosecutors to proceed with greater caution when deciding whether to bring strong charges in vehicular cases.
The baby was buried near his parents in Kiryas Joel, N.Y. Under their interpretation of Jewish law, Hasidim do not hold funerals for newborns who do not survive 30 days.
Coming a day after more than 1,000 mourners filled the street outside Congregation Yetev Lev D’Satmar in Williamsburg, the death of the Glauber baby on Monday upset those who had sought solace in his birth.
“We were pinning our hopes that this baby was going to be another Moshe who stayed on so there would be a memory of the parents,” said Rabbi David Niederman, referring to a Hasidic toddler who survived a 2008 terrorist attack in Mumbai that killed his parents. “Unfortunately, the child passed away.”

Nate Schweber contributed reporting.

Nate Schweber contributed reporting.